GIFT   OF 
W.    H.    Ivie 


CALIFORNIA  STATE  SERIES 

NEW 
GRAMMAR  SCHOOL  HISTORY 

OF   THE 

UNITED  .STATES 


Compiled  by  the  STATE  TEXT-BOOK  COMMITTEE,  and 
Approved  by  the  STATE  BOARD  OF  EDUCATION  .... 


HERODOTUS. 


SACRAMENTO: 

W.    W.    SHANNON,      -      -      SUPT.    STATE    PRINTING 
1903. 

^- 


EDUCATION  DEPT. 


A  : :::  s'.JJ**8®-? ^  T*-. 


In  the  compilation  of  this  work  certain  matter  from 
"  A  School  History  of  the  United  States,  by  John 
Bach  McMastcr,"  has  been  used.  All  such  matter 
is  protected  by  the  copyright  entry  noted  above. 


SB  30  M— AUG.  i,'o5. 


PREFACE 

IT  has  long  been  the  custom  to  begin  the  history  of  our 
country  with  the  discovery  of  the  New  World  by  Columbus. 
To  some  extent  this  is  both  wise  and  necessary;  but  in 
following  it  in  this  instance  the  attempt  has  been  made  to 
treat  the  colonial  period  as  the  childhood  of  the  United 
States;  to  have  it  bear  the  same  relation  to  our  later  career 
that  the  account  of  the  youth  of  a  great  man  should  bear  to 
that  of  his  maturer  years,  and  to  confine  it  to  the  narration 
of  such  events  as  are  really  necessary  to  a  correct  understand 
ing  of  what  has  happened  since  1776. 

The  story,  therefore,  has  been  restricted  to  the  discoveries, 
explorations,  and  settlements  within  the  United  States  by  the 
English,  French,  Spaniards,  and  Dutch;  to  the  expulsion  of 
the  French  by  the  English ;  to  the  planting  of  the  thirteen 
colonies  on  the  Atlantic  seaboard ;  to  the  origin  and  progress 
of  the  quarrel  which  ended  with  the  rise  of  thirteen  sovereign 
free  and  independent  states,  and  to  the  growth  of  such  politi 
cal  institutions  as  began  in  colonial  times.  This  period  once 
passed,  the  long  struggle  for  a  government  followed  till  our 
present  Constitution  —  one  of  the  most  remarkable  political 
instruments  ever  framed  by  man  —  was  adopted,  and  a  nation 
founded. 

MG9838 


6  PREFACE 

Scarcely  was  this  accomplished  when  the  French  Revolution 
and  the  rise  of  Napoleon  involved  us  in  a  struggle,  first  for 
our  neutral  rights,  and  then  for  our  commercial  independence, 
and  finally  in  a  second  war  with  Great  Britain.  During  this 
period  of  nearly  five  and  twenty  years,  commerce  and  agricul 
ture  flourished  exceedingly,  "but  our  internal  resources  were 
little  developed.  With  the  peace  of  1815,  however,  the  era 
of  industrial  development  commences,  and  this  has  been 
treated  with  great  —  though  it  is  believed  not  too  great  — 
fullness  of  detail;  for,  beyond  all  question,  the  event  of  the 
world's  history  during  the  nineteenth  century  is  the  growth 
of  the  United  States.  Nothing  like  it  has  ever  before  taken 
place. 

To  have  loaded  down  the  book  with  extended  bibliographies 
would  have  been  an  easy  matter,  but  quite  unnecessary.  The 
teacher  will  find  in  Channing  and  Hart's  Guide  to  the  Study  of 
American  History  the  best  digested  and  arranged  bibliography 
of  the  subject  yet  published,  and  cannot  afford  to  be  without 
it.  If  the  student  has  -time  and  disposition  to  read  one  half 
of  the  reference  books  cited  in  the  footnotes  of  this  history, 

he  is  most  fortunate. 

JOHN  BACH   McMASTER. 

UNIVERSITY  OF  PENNSYLVANIA. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAQB 

I.     EUROPE  FINDS  AMERICA 9 

II.  THE  SPANIARDS  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES      ...  19 

III.  ENGLISH,  DUTCH,  AND  SWEDES  ON  THE  SEABOARD      .  26 

IV.  THE  PLANTING  OF  NEW  ENGLAND         ....  40 
V.  THE  MIDDLE  AND  SOUTHERN  COLONIES        ...  54 

VI.  THE  FRENCH  IN  THE  MISSISSIPPI  VALLEY   ...  60 

VII.      THE  INDIANS 66 

VIII.  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEW  FRANCE  AND  LOUISIANA     .  76 

IX.      LIFE  IN  THE  COLONIES  IN  1763 93 

X.  "LIBERTY,  PROPERTY,  AND  No  STAMPS"     .        .        .110 

XI.  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE       ....  126 

XII.  UNDER  THE  ARTICLES  OF  CONFEDERATION  .        .        .155 

XIII.  MAKING  THE  CONSTITUTION 165 

XIV.  OUR  COUNTRY  IN  1790 175 

XV.      THE  RISE  OF  PARTIES 197 

XVI.  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY          ....  206 

XVII.  STRUGGLE  FOR  ''FREE  TRADE  AND  SAILORS'  RIGHTS"  224 

XVIII.  THE  WAR  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE         .        .  233 

XIX.  PROGRESS  OF  OUR  COUNTRY  BETWEEN  1790  AND  1815  241 

XX.  SETTLEMENT  OF  OUR  BOUNDARIES         ....  259 

XXI.      THE  RISING  WEST 266 

XXII.  THE  HIGHWAYS  OF  TRADE  AND  COMMERCE          .        .  279 

XXHI.      POLITICS  FROM  1824  TO  1845 294 

XXIV.  EXPANSION  OF  THE  SLAVE  AREA           ....  320 

XXV.  THE  TERRITORIES  BECOME  SLAVE  SOIL         ...  346 

XXVI.  PROGRESS  IN  UNITED  STATES  BETWEEN  1840  AND  1860  365 

XXVII.      WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,  1861-1865 378 

XXVIII.  WAR  ALONG  THE  COAST  AND  ON  THE  SEA  .        .        .  410 

XXIX.  THE  COST  OF  THE  WAR          .'.....  419 

XXX.  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  SOUTH  .        .        .        .        .  425 

XXXI.      THE  NEW  WEST  (1860-1870) 433 

XXXII.      POLITICS  FROM  1868  TO  1880 437 

7 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

XXXIII.  GROWTH  OF  THE  NORTHWEST 

XXXIV.  MECHANICAL  AND  INDUSTRIAL  PROGRESS 
XXXV.  POLITJCS  SINCE  188.0        .... 


PAGE 

454 
459 
462 


SUPPLEMENT 


CALIFORNIA  CHAPTER 


.  1-26 


APPENDIX 

DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE 
CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  . 
STATE  CONSTITUTIONS       .... 
INDEX  .  


LIST   OF   IMPORTANT   MAPS 

PAGE 


DISCOVERY  ON  THE  EAST  COAST 
OF  AMERICA  .  .  .15 

EUROPEAN  CLAIMS  AND  EXPLO 
RATIONS,  1650  .  .  61 

FRENCH  CLAIMS,  ETC.,  IN  1700    63 


BRITISH  COLONIES,  1733 


74,  75 


EUROPEAN  POSSESSIONS,  1763  .  90 
THE  BRITISH  COLONIES  IN  1764  111 
BRITISH  COLONIES,  1776  124,  125 
RESULTS  OF  THE  WAR  FOR  IN 


DEPENDENCE 


151 


THE  UNITED  STATES,  1783    156, 157 


THE  UNITED  STATES,  1789 


175 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  POPULATION, 

1790 177 

SLAVE  AND  FREE  SOIL  IN  1790  186 
THE  UNITED  STATES,  1801  .  244 
THE  UNITED  STATES,  1810  .  247 
NORTH  AMERICA  AFTER  1824  .  263 
DISTRIBUTION  OF  POPULATION, 

1820        .        .        .        .        .269 
FREEDOM  AND  SLAVERY  IN  1820  276 


1 
5 

17 
19 

PAGE 


THE  UNITED  STATES,  1826  298,  299 

TERRITORY  CLAIMED  BY  TEXAS 
IN  1845 321 

THE  OREGON  COUNTRY    .        .  325 

ROUTES  OF  THE  EARLY  EX 
PLORERS  ....  330 

TERRITORY  CEDED  BY  MEXICO, 
1848  AND  1853  .  .  .333 

RESULTS  OF  THE  COMPROMISE 
OF  1850 342 

THE  UNITED  STATES  IN  1851, 

348,  349 

EXPANSION  OF  SLAVE  SOIL, 
1790-1860  .  .  .  .357 

DISTRIBUTION  OF  POPULATION, 
1850 367 

THE  UNITED  STATES,  1861, 

384,  385 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION 


400,  401 


INDUSTRIAL     AND     RAILROAD 
MAP  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES, 

452,  453 


A  SCHOOL  HISTORY  OF  THE 
UNITED  STATES!'-'  rY; 


DISCOVERERS  AND  EXPLORERS 
CHAPTER    I 

EUROPE   FINDS    AMERICA 

1.  Nations  that  have  owned  our  Soil.  —  Before  the  United 
States  became  a  nation,  six  European  powers  owned,  or  claimed 
to  own,  various  portions  of  the  territory  now  contained  within 
its  boundary.     England  claimed  the  Atlantic  coast  from  Maine 
to  Florida.     Spain  once  held  Florida,  Texas,  California,  and 
all  the  territory  south  and  west  of  Colorado.     France  in  days 
gone  by  ruled  the  Mississippi  valley.      Holland  once  owned 
New  Jersey,  Delaware,  and  the  valley  of  the  Hudson  in  New 
York,  and  claimed  as  far  eastward  as  the  Connecticut  River. 
The  Swedes  had  settlements  on  the  Delaware.     Alaska  was  a 
Russian  possession. 

Before  attempting  to  narrate  the  history  of  our  country, 
it  is  necessary,  therefore,  to  tell 

1.  How  European  nations  came  into  possession  of  parts  of  it. 

2.  How  these  parts  passed  from  them  to  us. 

3.  What  effect  the  ownership  of  parts  of  our  country  by  Euro 

peans  had  on  our  history  and  institutions  before  1776. 

2.  European  Trade  with  the  East ;  the  Old  Routes.  —  For  two 
hundred  years  before  North  and  South  America  were  known 

9 


10 


DISCO VEKEKS   AND   EXPLORERS 


to  exist,  a  splendid  trade  had  been  going  on  between  Europe 
and  the  East  Indies.  Ships  loaded  with  metals,  woods,  and 
pitch  went  from  European  seaports  to  Alexandria  and  Con 
stantinople,  and  brought  back  silks  and  cashmeres,  muslins, 
dyewoods,  spices,  perfumes,  ivory,  precious  stones,  and  pearls. 
This  tvadfrin^  course,  of  time  had  come  to  be  controlled  by  the 
twa  Jtiliaii^cifcteS:  Of  : Venice  and  Genoa.  The  merchants  of 

Genoa  sent  their 
ships  to  Constan 
tinople  and  the 
ports  of  the  Black 
Sea,  where  they 
took  on  board  the 
rich  fabrics  and 
spices  which  by 
boats  and  by  car 
avans  had  come 
up  the  valley  of 
the  Euphrates  and 
the  Tigris  from  the 
Persian  Gulf.  The 
men  of  Venice,  on 
the  other  hand, 
sent  their  vessels 
to  Alexandria,  and 
carried  on  their  trade  with  the  East  through  the  Red  Sea. 

3.  New  Routes  wanted.  —  Splendid  as  this  trade  was,  how 
ever,  it  was  doomed  to  destruction.  Slowly,  but  surely,  the 
Turks  thrust  themselves  across  the  caravan  routes,  cutting  off 
one  by  one  the  great  feeders  of  the  Oriental  trade,  till,  with 
the  capture  of  Constantinople  in  1453,  they  destroyed  the 
commercial  career  of  Genoa.  As  their  power  wras  spreading 
rapidly  over  Syria  and  toward  Egypt,  the  prosperity  of  Venice, 
in  turn,  was  threatened.  The  day  seemed  near  when  all  trade 
between  the  Indies  and  Europe  would  be  ended,  and  men  began 
to  ask  if  it  were  not  possible  to  find  an  ocean  route  to  Asia. 


Routes  to  India 


EUROPE   FINDS  AMERICA  11 

Now,  it  happened  that  just  at  this  time  the  Portuguese  were 
hard  at  work  on  the  discovery  of  such  a  route,  and  were  slowly 
pushing  their  way  down  the  western  coast  of  Africa.  But  as 
league  after  league  of  that  coast  was  discovered,  it  was  thought 
that  the  route  to  India  by  way  of  Africa  was  too  long  for  the 
purposes  of  commerce.1  Then  came  the  question,  Is  there  not 
a  shorter  route  ?  and  this  Columbus  tried  to  answer. 

4.  Columbus  seeks  the  East  and  finds  America.2  —  Columbus 
was  a  native  of  Genoa,  in  Italy.  He  began  a  seafaring  life  at 
fourteen,  and  in  the  intervals  between  his  voyages  made  maps 
and  globes.  As  Portugal  was  then  the  center  of  nautical 
enterprise,  he  wandered  there  about  1470,  and  probably  went 
on  one  or  two  voyages  down  the  coast  of  Africa.  In  1473  he 
married  a  Portuguese  woman.  Her  father  had  been  one  of 
the  King  of  Portugal's  famous  navi 
gators,  and  had  left  behind  him  at  his 
death  a  quantity  of  charts  and  notes  ; 
and  it  was  while  Columbus  was  studying 
them  that  the  idea  of  seeking  the  Indies 
by  sailing  due  westward  seems  to  have 
first  started  in  his  mind.  But  many  a 
year  went  by,  and  many  a  hardship  had 
to  be  borne,  and  many  an  insult  patiently 
endured  in  poverty  and  distress,  before 
the  Friday  morning  in  August,  1492, 
when  his  three  caravels,  the  Santa  Maria 
(sahn'-tah  mah-ree'-ah),  the  Pinta  (peen'-  Santa  Maria 

tah),  and  the  Nina  (neen'-yah),  sailed  from  the  port  of  Palos 
(pah'-los),  in  Spain. 

His  course  led  first  to  the  Canary  Islands,  where  he  turned 

1  Read  the  account  of  Portuguese  exploration  in  search  of  a  way  to 
India,  in  Fiske's  Discovery  of  America,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  274-334. 

2  There  is  reason  to  believe  that  about  the  year  1000  A.D.  the  northeast 
coast  of  America  was  discovered  by  a  Norse  voyager  named  Leif  Ericsson. 
The  records  are  very  meager;  but  the  discovery  of  our  country  by  such  a 
people  is  possible  and  not  improbable.    For  an  account  of  the  pre-Colum 
bian  discoveries  see  Fiske's  Discovery  of  America,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  148-255, 


12 


DISCOVERERS  AND   EXPLORERS 


and  went  directly  westward.  The  earth  was  not  then  gener 
ally  believed  to  be  round.  Men  supposed  it  to  be  flat,  and  the 
only  parts  of  it  known  to  Europeans  were  Iceland,  the  British 
Isles,  the  continent  of  Europe,  a  small  part  of  Asia,  and  a 
strip  along  the  coast  of  the  northern  part  of  Africa.  The 
ocean  on  which  Columbus  was  now  embarked,  and  which  in 
our  time  is  crossed  in  less  than  a  week,  was  then  utterly 
unknown,  and  was  well  named  "  The  Sea  of  Darkness."  Little 
wonder,  then,  that  as  the  shores  of  the  last  of  the  Canaries 
sank  out  of  sight  on  the  9th  of  September,  many  of  the  sailors 
wept,  wailed,  and  loudly  bemoaned  their  cruel  fate.  After  sail 
ing  for  what  seemed  a  very  long  time,  they  saw  signs  of  land. 
But  when  no  land  appeared,  their  hopes  gave  way  to  fear,  and 
they  rose  against  Columbus  in  order  to  force  him  to  return. 

But  he  calmed  their  fears,  explained  the  sights  they  could 
not  understand,  hid  from  them  the  true  distance  sailed,  and 

kept  steadily  on  westward 
till  October  7,  when  a 
flock  of  land  birds  were 
seen  flying  to  the  south 
west.  Pinzon  (peen- 
thon'),  who  commanded 
one  of  the  vessels,  begged 
Columbus  to  follow  the 
birds,  as  they  seemed  to 
be  going  toward  land. 
Had  the  little  fleet  kept 
on  its  way,  it  would  have 
brought  up  on  the  coast 
of  Florida.  But  Colum 
bus  yielded  to  Pinzon.  The  ships  were  headed  southwest- 
ward,  and  about  ten  o'clock  on  the  night  of  October  11, 
Columbus  saw  a  light  moving  in  the  distance.  It  was  made 
by  the  inhabitants  going  from  hut  to  hut  on  a  neighboring 
coast.  At  dawn  the  shore  itself  was  seen  by  a  sailor,  and 
Columbus,  followed  by  many  of  his  men,  hastened  to  the 


Nina 


EUROPE   FINDS  AMERICA 


13 


beach,  where,  October  12,  1492,  he  raised  a  huge  cross,  and 
took  possession  of  the  country  in  the  name  of  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella,  King  and  Queen  of  Spain,  who  had  supplied  him 
with  caravels  and  men.1  He  had  landed  on  one  of  a  group  of 
islands  which  we  call  the  Bahamas.2 

During  ten  days  he  sailed  among  these  islands.  Then, 
turning  southward,  he  coasted  along  Cuba  to  the  eastern  end, 
and  so  to  Haiti,  which  he  named 
Hispaniola,  or  Little  Spain.  There 
the  Santa  Maria  was  wrecked. 
The  Pinta  had  by  this  time  de 
serted  him,  and,  as  the  Nina 
could  not  carry  all  the  men,  forty 
were  left  at  Hispaniola,  to  found 
the  first  colony  of  Europeans  in 
the  New  World.  Giving  the  men 
food  enough  to  last  a  year,  Colum 
bus  set  sail  for  Spain  on  the  3d  of 
January,  1493,  and  on  March  15 
was  safe  at  Palos. 

Of  the  greatness  of  his  discov 
ery,  Columbus  had  not  the  faintest 

idea.  That  he  had  found  a  new  world;  that  a  continent  was 
blocking  his  way  to  the  East,  never  entered  his  mind.  He 
supposed  he  had  landed  on  some  islands  off  the  east  coast  of 
Asia,  and  as  that  coast  was  called  the  Indies,  and  as  the 
islands  were  reached  by  sailing  westward,  they  came  to  be 
called  the  West  Indies,  and  their  inhabitants  Indians;  and 
the  native  races  of  the  New  World  have  ever  since  been  called 

1  Columbus  called  the  new  land  San  Salvador  (sahn  sahl-vah-dor', 
Holy  Savior),  because  October  12,  the  day  on  which  it  was  discovered, 
was  so  named  in  the  Spanish  calendar. 

2  Three  islands  of  this  group,  Cat,  Turks,   and  Watlings,  have  rival 
claims  as  the  landing  place  of  Columbus.     At  present,  Watlings  Island 
is  believed  to  be  the  one  on  which  he  first  set  foot.     Read  an  account 
of  the  voyage  in  Fiske's  Discovery  of  America,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  408-442; 
Irving's  Life  and  Voyages  of  Columbus,  Vol.  I.,  Book  III. 


Coat  of  arms  of  Columbus 


14  DISCOVERERS  AND  EXPLORERS 

Indians.  Although  Columbus  in  after  years  made  three  more 
voyages  to  the  New  World,  he  never  found  out  his  mistake, 
and  died  firm  in  the  belief  that  he  had  discovered  a  direct 
route  to  Asia.1 

5.  The  Atlantic  Coast  explored. — And  now  that  Columbus 
had  shown  the  way,  others  were   quick  to  follow.     In  1497 
and  1498  came  John  and  Sebastian  Cabot  (cab'-ot),  sailing 
under  the   flag   of    England,  and   exploring  our   coast   from 
Labrador   to   Cape   Cod;   and   Pinzon   and   Solis,  with  Ves- 
pucius2  for  pilot,  sailing  under  the  flag  of  Spain  along  the 
shores  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  around  the  peninsula  of  Florida, 
and  northward  to  Chesapeake  Bay.     Between  1500  and  1502 
two   Portuguese   navigators  named  Cortereal   (cor-ta-ra-ahl') 
went  over  much  the  same  ground  as  the  Cabots.     For  the 
time  being,  however,  these  voyages  were  fruitless.     It  was  not 
a  new  world,  but  China  and  Japan,  the  Indian  Ocean,  and  the 
spice  islands,  that  Europe  was  seeking.     When,  therefore,  in 
1497,  Vasco  da  Gama  sailed  from  Lisbon,,  passed  around  the 
end  of  Africa,  reached  India,  and  came  back  to  Portugal  in 
1499  with  his  ship  laden  with  the  silks  and  spices  of  the  East, 
all  explorers  turned  southward,   and  for  eleven  years  after 
the  visit  of  the  Cortereals  no  voyages  were  made  to  North 
America. 

6.  Why  the  Continent  was  called  America.  — But  some  great 
voyages  meantime  were  made  to  South  America.     In  1500  a 
Portuguese  fleet  of  thirteen  vessels,   commanded  by  Cabral, 
started  from  Portugal  for  the  East.     In  place  of  following  the 

1  Columbus  began  his  second  voyage  in  September,  1493,  and  discovered 
Jamaica,  Porto  Rico  (por'-to  ree'-co) ,  and  the  islands  of  the  Caribbean 
Sea.     On  his  third  voyage,  in  1498,  he  discovered  the  island  of  Trinidad, 
off  the  coast  of  Venezuela,  and  saw  South  America  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Orinoco  River.    During  his  fourth  and  last  voyage,  1502-1504,  he  explored 
the  shores  of  Honduras  and  the  Isthmus  of  Panama  in  search  of  a  strait 
leading  to  the  Indian  Ocean.     Of  course  he  did  not  find  it,  and,  going 
back  to  Spain,  he  died  poor  and  broken-hearted  on  May  20,  1506. 

2  As  this  man  was  an  Italian,  his  name  was  really  Amerigo  Vespucci 
(ah-ma'-ree-go  ves-poot'-chee) ,  but  it  is  usually  given  in  its  Latinized 
form,  Americus  Vespucius  (a-mer'-i-cus  ves-pu'-she-us). 


EASTERN  A  s  f  A  :';,;,,^ 


DISCOVERY 

ON  THE  EAST  COAST  OF 

AMERICA 


16  DISCOVERERS  AND   EXPLORERS 

usual  route  and  hugging  the  west  coast  of  Africa,  Cabral  went 
off  so  far  to  the  westward  that  one  day  in  April,  1500,  he  was 
amazed  to  see  land.  It  proved  to  be  what  is  now  Brazil,  and 
after  sailing  along  a  little  way  he  sent  one  of  his  vessels  home 
to  Portugal  with  the  news. 

He  did  this  because  six  years  before,  in  June,  1494,  Spain 
and  Portugal  made  a  treaty  and  agreed  that  a  meridian  should 
be  drawn  370  leagues  west  of  the  Cape  Verde  Islands  and  be 
known  as  "The  Line  of  Demarcation."  All  heathen  lands 
discovered,  no  matter  by  whom,  to  the  east  of  this  line,  were 
to  belong  to  Portugal;  all  to  the  west  of  it  were  to  be  the 
property  of  Spain.  Now,  as  the  strange  coast  seemed  to  be 
east  of  the  line  of  demarcation,  and  therefore  the  property  of 
Portugal,  Cabral  sent  word  to  the  King  that  he  might  explore  it. 

Accordingly,  in  May,  1501,  the  King  sent  out  three  ships  in 
charge  of  Americus  Vespucius.  Vespucius  sighted  the  coast 
somewhere  about  Cape  St.  Roque,  and,  finding  that  it  was  east 
of  the  line  of  demarcation,  explored  it  southward  as  far  as  the 
mouth  of  the  river  La  Plata.  As  he  was  then  west  of  the  line, 
and  off  a  coast  which  belonged  to  Spain,  he  turned  and  sailed 
southeastward  till  he  struck  the  island  of  South  Georgia, 
where  the  Antarctic  cold  and  the  fields  of  floating  ice  stopped 
him  and  sent  him  back  to  Lisbon. 

The  results  of  this  great  voyage  were  many.  In  the  first 
place,  it  secured  Brazil  for  Portugal.  In  the  second  place,  it 
changed  the  geographical  ideas  of  the  time.  The  great  length 
of  coast  line  explored  proved  that  the  land  was  not  a  mere 
island,  but  that  Vespucius  had  found  a  new  continent  in  the 
southern  hemisphere,  —  off  the  coast  of  Asia,  as  was  then  sup 
posed.  This  for  a  time  was  called  the  "  Fourth  Part "  of  the 
world, — the  other  three  parts  being  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa. 
But  in  1507  a  German  professor  published  a  little  book  on 
geography,  in  which  he  suggested  that  the  new  part  of  the 
world  discovered  by  Americus,  the  part  which  we  call  Brazil, 
should  be  called  America. 

As  Columbus  was  not  supposed  to  have  discovered  a  new 


EUROPE  FINDS  AMERICA 


17 


world,  but  merely  a  new  route  to  Asia,  this  suggestion  seemed 
very  proper,  and  soon  the  word  "  America  "  began  to  appear  on 
maps  as  the  name  of  Brazil.  After  a  while  it  was  applied 
to  all  South  America,  and  finally  to  North  America  also. 

7.  The  Pacific  discovered  ;  the  Mexican  Gulf  Coast  explored.  — 
A  few  years  after  the  publication  of  the  little  book  which 
gave  the  New  World  the  name  of  America,  a  Spaniard  named 
Balboa  landed  on  the  Isthmus  of  "Panama,  crossed  it  (1513), 
and  from  the  mountains  looked  down  on  an  endless  expanse 
of  blue  water,  which  he  called  the  South  Sea,  because  when 
he  first  saw  it  he  was  looking  south. 

Meantime  another  Spaniard,  named  Ponce  de  Leon  (pon'- 
tha  da  la-on'),  sailed  with  three  ships  from  Porto  Rico,  in 
March,  1513,  and  on  the  27th  of  that  month  came  in  sight  of 
the  mainland.  As  the  _ 
day  was  Easter  Sun 
day,  which  the  Span 
iards  call  Pascua 
(pas'-coo-ah)  Florida, 
he  called  the  country 
Florida. 

Six  years  later 
(1519)  Pineda  (pe-na'- 
da)  skirted  "the  shores 
of  the  Gulf  from  Flor 
ida  to  Mexico. 

8.  Spaniards  sail  round  the  World.  —  In  the  same  year  (1519) 
that  Pineda  explored   the  Gulf  coast,  a  Portuguese   named 
Magellan  (ma-jel'-an)  led  a  Spanish  fleet  across  the  Atlantic. 
He  coasted  along  South  America  to  Tierra  del  Fuego,  entered 
the  strait  which  now  bears  his  name,  passed  well  up  the  west 
ern  coast,  and  turning  westward  sailed  toward  India.     He  was 
then  on  the  ocean  which  Balboa  had  discovered  and  named 
the  South  Sea.    But  Magellan  found  it  so  much  smoother  than 

1  Showing  what  was  then  supposed  to  be  the  shape  and  position  of  the 
newly  discovered  lands. 

McM.  HIST.— 2 


Map  of  1515 


18  DISCOVERERS   AND   EXPLORERS 

the  Atlantic  that  he  called  it  the  Pacific.  Five  ships  and  254 
men  left  Spain;  but  only  one  ship  and  fifteen  men  returned 
to  Spain  by  way  of  India  and  Cape  of  Good  Hope.  Magellan 
himself  was  among  the  dead.1 

9.  Importance  of  Magellan's  Voyage.  —  Of  all  the  voyages 
ever  made  by  man  this  was  the  greatest.2     In  the  first  place, 
it  proved  beyond  dispute   that   the   earth   is  round.     In  the 
second  place,  it  proved  that  South  America  is  a  great  conti 
nent,  and  that  there  is  no  short  southwest  passage  to  India. 

10.  Search  for  a  Northwest  Passage ;  our  North  Atlantic  Coast 
explored.  —  All  eyes,  therefore,  turned  northward;  the  quest 
for  a  northwest  passage  began,  and  in  that  quest  the  Atlantic 
coast  of  the  United  States  was  examined  most  thoroughly. 

SUMMARY 

1.  Towards  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  Turks  cut  off  the  old 

route  of  trade  between  Asia  and  Europe. 

2.  In  attempting  to  find  a  new  way  to  Asia,  the  Portuguese  then  began 

to  explore  the  west  coast  of  Africa. 

3.  When  at  last  they  got  well  down  the  African  coast  it  was  thought 

that  such  a  route  was  too  long. 

4.  Columbus  (1492)  then  attempted  to  find  a  shorter  way  to  Asia  by 

sailing  westward  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  and  landed  on  some 
islands  which  he  supposed  to  be  the  East  Indies. 

5.  The  explorations  of  men  who  followed  Columbus  proved  that  a  new 

continent  had  been  discovered  and  that  it  blocked  the  way  to  India. 

6.  The   attempts  to  find  a  southwest  passage  or  a  northwest  passage 

through  our  continent  led  to  the  exploration  of  the  Atlantic  and 
Pacific  coasts. 

7.  The  new  world  was  called  America,  after  the  explorer  Americus. 

8.  The  voyage  of  Magellan  proved  that  the  earth  is  round. 

1  Magellan  was  killed  by  the  natives  of  one  of  the  Philippine  Islands. 
The  captain  of  the  ship  which  made  the  voyage  was  greatly  honored.    The 
King  of  Spain  ennobled  him,  and  on  his  coat  of  arms  was  a  globe  repre 
senting  the  earth,  and  on  it  the  motto  "  You  first  sailed  round  me." 

2  By  all  means  read  the  account  of  this  voyage  by  Fiske,  in  his  Discov 
ery  of  America,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  190-211. 


CHAPTER   II 


THE   SPANIARDS   IX   THE    UNITED   STATES 

11.  The  Spaniards  explore  the  Southwest. — Xow  it  must 
be  noticed  that  up  to  1513  no  European  had  explored  the  in 
terior  of  either  Xorth  or  South  America.  They  had  merely 
touched  the  shores.  In  1513  the  work  of  exploration  began. 
Balboa  then  crossed  the  Isthmus  of  Panama.  In  1519  Cortes 
(cor'-tez)  landed  on  the  coast  of  Mexico  with  a  body  of  men, 
and  marched  boldly  into  the  heart  of  the  country  to  the  city 
where  lived  the  great  Indian  chief  or  king,  Montezuma.  Cortes 
took  the  city  and  made  himself  master  of  Mexico.  This  was 


Map  of  1530,  Sloane  MS.* 

1  Notice  that  the  two  continents  begin  to  take  shape,  and  'that  as  the 
result  of  Magellan's  voyage  is  not  generally  known,  North  America  is 
placed  very  near  to  Java. 

19 


20  DISCOVERERS   AND   EXPLORERS 

most  important;  for  the  conquest  of  Mexico  turned  the  attention 
of  the  Spaniards  from  our  country  for  many  years,  and  finally 
led  to  the  exploration  of  the  Southwest.  But  the  first  explor 
ers  of  what  is  now  the  United  States  came  from  Cuba  in  1528. 

In  that  year  Narvaez  (nar-vahr-eth),  excited  by  Pineda's  ac 
counts  of  the  Mississippi  Indians  and  their  golden  orna 
ments,  set  forth  with  400  men  to  conquer  the  north  coast  of 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  At  Apalachee  Bay  he  landed,  and  made 
a  raid  inland.  On  returning  to  the  shore,  he  missed  his  ships, 
and  after  traveling  westward  on  foot  for  a  month,  built  five 
rude  vessels,  and  once  more  put  to  sea.  For  six  weeks  the 
little  fleet  hugged  the  shore,  till  it  came  to  the  mouth  of  the 
Mississippi,  where  two  of  the  boats  were  upset  and  Xarvaez 
was  drowned.  The  rest  reached  the  coast  of  Texas  in  safety. 
But  famine  and  the  tomahawk  soon  reduced  the  number  of 
the  survivors  to  four.  These  were  captured  by  bands  of  wan 
dering  Indians,  were  carried  over  eastern  Texas  and  western 
Louisiana,  till,  after  many  strange  adventures  and  vicissitudes, 
they  met  beyond  the  Sabine  River.1  Protected  by  the  fame 
they  had  won  for  sorcery,  and  led  by  one  Cabeza  de  Vaca,  they 
now  wandered  westward  to  the  Rio  Grande2  (reeLo  grahn'-da) 
and  on  by  Chihuahua  (chee-wah'-wah)  and  Sonora  to  the  Gulf 
of  California,  and  by  this  to  Culiacan,  a  town  near  the  west 
coast  of  Mexico,  which  they  reached  in  1536.  They  had 
crossed  the  continent. 

12.  "  The  Seven  Cities  of  Cibola."  —  The  story  these  men  told 
of  the  strange  country  through  which  they  had  passed,  aroused 
a  strong  desire  in  the  Spaniards  to  explore  it,  for  somewhere 
in  that  direction  they  believed  were  the  Seven  Cities.  Accord 
ing  to  an  ancient  legend,  when  the  Arabs  invaded  the  Spanish 
peninsula,  a  bishop  of  Lisbon  with  many  followers  fled  to  a 
group  of  islands  in  the  Sea  of  Darkness,  and  on  them  founded 
seven  cities.  As  one  of  the  Indian  tribes  had  preserved  a  story 
of  Seven  Caves  in  which  their  ancestors  had  once  lived,  the 

1  Now  the  western  boundary  of  Louisiana. 

2  Rio  Grande  del  Norte  —  Great  River  of  the  North. 


THE   SPANIARDS   IN  THE   UNITED   STATES 


21 


credulous  and  romantic  Spaniards  easily  confounded  the  two 
legends.  Firmly  believing  that  the  seven  cities  must  exist 
in  the  north  country  traversed  by  Vaca,  Mendoza,  the  Spanish 
governor  of  Mexico,  selected  Fray  Marcos,  a  monk  of  great 
ability,  and  sent  him  forth  with  a  few  followers  to  search  for 
them.  Directed  by  the  Indians  through  whose  villages  he 
passed,  he  came  at  last  in  sight  of  the  seven  Zufii  (zoo'-nyee) 
pueblos  (pweb'-loz)  of  New  Mexico,  all  of  which  were  inhab- 


The  kind  of  cities  found  by  Marcos  and  Coronado  in  the  Rio  Grande  valley 

ited  in  his  time.  But  he  came  no  nearer  than  just  within 
sight  of  them.  For  one  of  the  party,  who  went  on  in  advance, 
having  been  killed  by  the  Zuili,  Fray  Marcos  hurried  back  to 
Culiacan.  Understanding  the  name  of  the  city  he  had  seen 
to  be  Cibola  (see'-bo-la),  he  called  the  pueblos  the  "Seven 
Cities  of  Cibola,"  and  against  them  the  next  year  (1540)  Coro 
nado  marched  with  1100  men.  Finding  the  pueblos  were  not 
the  rich  cities  for  which  he  sought,  Coronado  pushed  on  east- 


22 


DISCOVERERS  AND   EXPLORERS 


CORO^ADOS 
EXPEDITION 

1540 


ward,  and  for  two 
years  wandered  to 
and  fro  over  the 
plains  and  mountains 
of  the  West,  cross 
ing  the  state  of  Kan 
sas  twice.1 

13.  The  Spaniards 
on  the  Mississippi.  — 
In  1537  De  Soto  was 
appointed  governor 
of  Cuba,  with  in 
structions  to  conquer 
and  hold,  all  the 
country  discovered  by  Narvaez.  On  this  mission  he  set  out 
in  May,  1539,  and  landed  at  Tampa  Bay,  on  the  west  coast 
of  our  state  of  Florida.  He  wandered  over  the  swamps  and 
marshes,  the  moss-grown  jungles,  and  the  forests  of  the  Gulf 
states,  and  spent  the  winter  of  1541  near  the  Yazoo  River. 
•Crossing  the  Mississippi  in  the  spring  of  1542  at  the  Chicka- 
Isaw  Bluffs,  he  wandered  about  eastern  Arkansas,  till  he  died 
of  fever,  and  was  buried  in  the  Mississippi.  His  followers 
then  built  rude  boats,  floated  down  the  river  to  the  Gulf, 
•steered  along  the  coast  of  Texas,  and  in  September,  1543, 
reached  Tampico,  in  Mexico. 

More  than  half  a  century  had  now  gone  by  since  the  first 
voyage  of  Columbus.  Yet  not  a  settlement,  great  or  small, 
had  been  established  by  Spain  within  our  boundary.  Between 
1546  and  1561  missionaries  twice  attempted  to  found  missions 
and  convert  the  Indians  in  Florida,  and  twice  were  driven 
away.  In  1582  others  entered  the  valleys  of  the  Gila  and  the 
Rio  Grande,  took  possession  of  the  pueblos,  established  mis 
sions,  preached  the  Gospel  to  the  Indians,  and  brought  them 

1  Do  not  fail  to  read  a  delightful  little  book  called  The  Spanish 
Pioneers,  by  Charles  F.  Lummis.  In  it  the  story  of  these  great  journeys 
is  told  on  pp.  77-88,  101-143. 


THE  SPANIARDS   IN  THE   UNITED   STATES 


23 


under  the  dominion  of  Spain.  But  when  Santa  Fd  (sahn'-tah 
fa')  was  founded,  in  1582,  the  only  colony  of  Spain  in  the 
United  States,  besides  the  missions  in  Arizona  and  New 
Mexico,  was  St.  Augustine  in  Florida. 


A  Spanish  mission 

14.  St.  Augustine.  —  St.  Augustine  was  founded  by  the 
Spaniards  in  order  to  keep  out  the  French,  who  made  two 
attempts  to  occupy  the  south  Atlantic  coast.  The  first  was 
that  of  John  Ribault  (ree-bof).  He  led  a  colony  of  French 
men,  in  1562,  to  what  is  now  South  Carolina,  built  a  small 
fort  on  a  spot  which  he  called  Port  Royal,  and  left  it  in  charge 
of  thirty  men  while  he  went  back  to  France  for  more  colo 
nists.  The  men  were  a  shiftless  set,  depended  on  the  Indians 
till  the  Indians  would  feed  them  no  longer,  and  when  famine 
set  in,  they  mutinied,  slew  their  commander,  built  a  crazy 
ship  and  went  to  sea,  where  an  English  vessel  found  them  in 
a  starving  condition,  and  took  them  to  London. 

In  1564  a  second  party,  under  Laudonniere  (lo-do-ne-ar'), 
landed  at  the  St.  Johns  River  in  Florida,  and  built  a  fort 


DISCOVERERS   AND   EXPLORERS 


called  Fort  Caroline  in  honor  of  Charles  IX.  of  France.  But 
the  King  of  Spain,  hearing  that  the  French  were  trespass 
ing,  sent  an  expedition  .under  Menendez  (ma-nen'-deth),  who 
founded  St.  Augustine  in  1565.  There  Ribault,  who  had  re 
turned  and  joined  Laudonniere,  attempted  to  attack  the  Span 
iards.  But  a  hurricane 
scattered  his  ships,  and 
while  it  was  still  raging, 
Menendez  fell  suddenly 
on  Fort  Caroline  and  mas 
sacred  men,  women,  and 
children.  A  few  days 
later,  falling  in  with  Bi- 
bault  and  his  men,  who 
had  been  driven  ashore 
south  of  St.  Augustine, 
Menendez  massacred  150 
more.1  For  this  foul 
deed  a  Frenchman  named 
Gourgues (goorg)  exacted 
a  fearful  penalty.  With 

three    small    ships    and 
Gateway  at  St.  Augustine2  ,  .,    , 

200    men,    he    sailed    to 

the  St.  Johns  River,  took  and  destroyed  the  fort  which  the 
Spaniards  had  built  on  the  site  of  Fort  Caroline,  and  put  to 
death  every  human  being  within  it. 


SUMMARY 

1.  From  1492  to  1513  the  Europeans  who  came  to  America  explored  the 

coasts  of  North  and  South  America,  but  did  not  go  inland. 

2.  In  1513  exploration  of  the  interior  of  the  two  continents  began.     Bal 

boa  crossed  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  1513,  and  Cortes  conquered 
Mexico,  1519-21. 

1  The   story  of  the  French  in  Florida  is  finely  told   in  Parkman's 
Pioneers  of  France  in  the  New  World;  also  J.  Sparks's  Life  of  Eibault ; 
Baird's  Huguenot  Emigration. 

2  Remaining  from  the  Spanish  occupation  of  Florida. 


THE   SPANIARDS   IN  THE   UNITED   STATES 


25 


In  1528  Narvaez  made  the  first  serious  attempt  to  enter  the  Mississippi 
valley.  He  died,  and  some  of  his  followers,  under  Cabeza  de  Vaca, 
crossed  the  continent. 

When  the  Spanish  governor  of  Mexico  heard  their  story,  he  sent  Fray 
Marcos  to  find  the  "Seven  Cities  of  Cibola"  ;  and  began  the  ex 
ploration  of  the  southwestern  part  of  the  United  States. 

In  1539-1541  De  Soto  and  his  band  explored  the  southeastern  part  of 
the  United  States  from  Florida  to  the  Mississippi  River. 

By  1582  two  Spanish  settlements  had  been  made  in  the  United  States 
—  St.  Augustine,  1565,  and  Santa  F6",  1582. 

1492.  Columbus.     Islands  off  the  coast. 

1493.  Columbus.     Islands  off  the  coast. 

1497.  John  Cabot.     North  America.     Labrador. 

1498.  John   and   Sebastian   Cabot,     Labrador  to  Cape 

Cod. 
Pinzon  and  Solis.     Florida  to  Chesapeake  Bay. 

1500.  Cabral.     Discovers  Brazil. 

1501.  Vespucius.     Explores  Brazilian  coast. 


1500-1502.     Cortereals. 
1513.     Ponce  de  Leon. 


Explore  coast  North  America. 
Discovers  and  names  Florida. 


I  , 
g 


1498.     Pinzon  and  Solis.     Explore  Gulf  of  Mexico  and 

coast  of  Florida. 

1519.     Pineda.     Sails  from  Florida  to  Mexico. 
1528.     Narvaez.     Florida  to  Texas. 
1543.     Followers  of  De  Soto  sail  from  Mississippi  River 

to  Mexico. 

1519-21.     Cortes.     Conquers  Mexico. 

1534-36.  De  Vaca,  From  the  Sabine  River  to  the  Gulf 
of  California. 

1539.  Fray  Marcos.  Search  for  the  Seven  Cities.  Wan 
ders  over  New  Mexico. 

1540-42.  Coronado.  Gila  River,  Rio  Grande,  Colorado 
River. 

1539-41.  De  Soto.  Wanders  over  Florida,  Georgia,  and 
Alabama,  and  reaches  the  Mississippi  River. 

1582-1600.  Spaniards  in  the  valleys  of  the  Gila  and  Rio 
Grande. 


{  1513.     Balboa.     Discovers  the  Pacific  Ocean. 


1520.    Magellan.     Sails  around  South  America  into  the 

Pacific. 
1578-1580.     Drake.     Sails  around  South  America  and 

up  the  Pacific  coast  to  Oregon.     (See  p.  26.) 


THE    ENGLISH   COLONIES 
CHAPTER   III 

ENGLISH,    DUTCH,   AND   SWEDES    ON  THE   SEABOARD 

15.  The  English  Claim  to  the  Seaboard.  —  After  the  Spaniards 
had  thus  explored  the  coast  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  what 
is  now  Arizona,  New  Mexico,  and  Texas,  the  English  attempted 
to  take  possession  of  the  Atlantic  coast.  The  voyages  of  John 
and  Sebastian  Cabot  in  1497  and  1498  were  not  followed  up  in 
the  same  way  that  Spain  followed  up  those  of  Columbus,  and 
for  nearly  eighty  years  the  flag  of  England  was  not  displayed 
in  any  of  our  waters.1  At  last,  in  1576,  Sir  Martin  Frobisher 
set  out  to  find  a  northwest  passage  to  Asia.  Of  course  he 
failed;  but  in  that  and  two  later  voyages  he  cruised  about 
the  shores  of  our  continent  and  gave  his  name  to  Frobisher's 
Bay.2  Next  came  Sir  Francis  Drake,  the  greatest  seaman  of 
his  age.  He  left  England  in  1577,  crossed  the  Atlantic,  sailed 
down  the  South  American  coast,  passed  through  the  Strait  of 
Magellan,  and  turning  northward  coasted  along  South  America, 
Mexico,  and  California,  in  search  of  a  northeast  passage  to  the 
Atlantic.  When  he  had  gone  as  far  north  as  Oregon  the 
weather  grew  so  cold  that  his  men  began  to  murmur,  and 
putting  his  ship  about,  he  sailed  southward  along  our  Pacific 
coast  in  search  of  a  harbor,  which  in  June,  1579,  he  found  near 
the  present  city  of  San  Francisco.  There  he  landed,  and 
putting  up  a  post  nailed  to  it  a  brass  plate  on  which  was  the 

1  For  Cabot's  voyages  read  Fiske's  Discovery  of  America,  Vol.  II., 
pp.  2-15. 

2  See  map  on  p.  15. 

26 


THE  ENGLISH  ON  THE  SEABOARD          27 

name  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  took  possession  of  the  country.1 
Despairing  of  finding  a  short  passage  to  England,  Drake  finally 
crossed  the  Pacific  and  reached  home  by  way  of  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope.  He  had  sailed  around  the  globe.2 

16.  Gilbert  and  Ralegh  attempt  to  found  a  Colony.  —  While 
Drake  was  making  his  voyage,  another  gallant  seaman,  Sir 
Humphrey  Gilbert,  was  given  (by  Queen  Elizabeth)  any  new 
land  he  might  discover  in  America.      His  first  attempt  (1579) 
was  a  failure,  and  while  on  his  way  home  from  a  landing  on 
Newfoundland  (1583),  his  ship,  with  all  on  board,  went  down 
in  a  storm  at  sea.      The  next  year   (1584)  his  half-brother, 
Sir  Walter  Ralegh,  one  of  the  most  accomplished  men  of  his 
day  and  a  great  favorite  with  Queen  Elizabeth,  obtained  per 
mission  from  the  Queen  to  make  a  settlement  on  any  part  of 
the  coast   of    America  not   already  occupied  by  a  Christian 
power ;  and  he  at  once  sent  out  an  expedition.     The  explorers 
landed  on  Roanoke  Island,  off  the  coast  of  what  is  now  North 
Carolina,  and  came  home  with  such  a  glowing  description  of 
the  "  good  land  "  they  had  found  that  the  Virgin  Queen  called 
it  "Virginia,"  in  honor  of  herself,  and  Ralegh  determined  to 
colonize  it.3 

17.  Roanoke   Colony;    the   Potato   and    Tobacco.  —  In   1585, 
accordingly,  108  emigrants  under  Ralph  Lane  left  England 
and  began  to  build  a  town  on  Roanoke  Island.     They  were 
ill  suited  for  this  kind  of  pioneer  life,  and  were  soon  in  such 
distress  that,  had  not  Sir  Francis  Drake  in  one  of  his  voyages 
happened  to  touch  at  Roanoke,  they  would  have  starved  to 
death.     Drake,  seeing  their  helplessness,  carried  them  home  to 
England.     Yet  their  life  on  the  island  was  not  without  results, 
for  they  took  back  with  them  the  potato,  and  some  dried  tobacco 
leaves  which  the  Indians  had  taught  them  to  smoke. 

1  The  white  cliffs  reminded  Drake  strongly  of  the  cliffs  of  Dover,  and 
as  one  of  the  old  names  of  England   was  Albion  (the  country  of  the 
white  cliffs),  he  called  the  land  New  Albion. 

2  For  Drake  read  E.  T.  Payne's  Voyages  of  Elizabethan  Seamen. 

3  For  Ralegh  read  E.  Gosse's  Raleigh  (in  English  Worthies  Series); 
Louise  Creighton's  Sir  W.  Ralegh  (Historical  Biographies  Series). 


28 


THE    ENGLISH   COLONIES 


Ralegh,  of  course,  was  greatly  disappointed  to  see  his  colo 
nists  again  in  England.  But  he  was  not  discouraged,  and  in 
1587  sent  forth  a  second  band.  The  first  had  consisted 
entirely  of  men.  The  second  band  was  composed  of  both 
men  and  women  with  their  families,  for  it  seemed  likely  that 

if  the  men  took  their 
wives  and  children 
along  they  would  be 
more  likely  to  remain 
than  if  they  went 
alone.  John  White 
was  the  leader,  and 
with  a  charter  and 
instructions  to  build 
the  city  of  Ralegh 
somewhere  on  the 
shores  of  Chesapeake 
Bay  he  set  off  with  his 
colonists  and  landed 
on  Roanoke  Island. 
Here  a  little  grand 
daughter  was  born 
(August  18,  1587), 
and  named  Virginia. 
She  was  the  child  of 
Eleanor  Dare,  and 
was  the  first  child 
born  of  English  par- 
Roanoke  Island  and  vicinity  entg  in  America. 

Governor  White  soon  found  it  necessary  to  go  back  to  Eng 
land  for  supplies,  and,  in  consequence  of  the  Spanish  war, 
three  years  slipped  by  before  he  was  able  to  return  to  the 
colony.  He  was  then  too  late.  Every  soul  had  perished,  and 
to  this  day  nobody  knows  how  or  where.  Ralegh  could  do 
no  more,  and  in  1589  made  over  all  his  rights  to  a  joint-stock 
company  of  merchants.  This  company  did  nothing,  and 


Cape  Lookout 


THE  ENGLISH  ON  THE  SEABOARD          29 

the  sixteenth  century  came  to  an  end  with  no  English  colony 
in  America.1 

18.  Gosnold  in  New  England.  —  With  the  new  century  came 
better    fortune.      Kalegh's    noble    efforts    to    plant   a   colony 
aroused   Englishmen  to  the  possibility  of  founding  a  great 
empire  in  the  New  World,  and  especially  one  named  Bartholo 
mew  Gosnold. 

Instead  of  following  the  old  route  to  America  by  way  of  the 
Canary  Islands,  the  West  Indies,  and  Florida,  he  sailed  due 
west  across  the  Atlantic,2  and  brought  up  on  the  shore  of  a 
cape  which  he  named  Cape  Cod.3  Following  the  shore  south 
ward,  he  passed  through  Nantucket  Sound  and  Vineyard 
Sound,  till  he  came  to  Cuttyhuuk  Island,  at  the  entrance  of 
Buzzards  Bay.  On  this  he  landed,  and  built  a  house  for  the 
use  of  colonists  he  intended  to  leave  there.  But  when  he  had 
filled  his  ship  with  sassafras  roots  and  cedar  logs,  nobody  would 
remain,  and  the  whole  company  went  back  to  England.4 

19.  The  Two  Virginia  Companies.  — As  a  result  of  this  voyage, 
Gosnold  was  more  eager  than  ever  to  plant  a  colony  in  Vir 
ginia,  and  this  enthusiasm  he  communicated  so  fully  to  others 
that,  in  1606,  King  James  I.  created  two  companies  to  settle 
in  Virginia,  which  was  then  the  name  for  all  the  territory 
from  what  is  now  Maine  to  Florida. 

1.  Each  company  was  to  own  a  block  of  land  100  miles 
square;  that  is,  100  miles  along  the  coast,  —  50  miles 
each  way  from  its  first  settlement,  —  and  100  miles  into 
the  interior. 

1  Doyle's  English   Colonies  in  America,  Virginia,  pp.   56-74 ;   Ban 
croft's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  60-79;  Hildreth's  History 
of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I. ,  pp.  80-87. 

2  By  thus  shortening  the  journey  3000  miles,  he  practically  brought 
America  3000  miles  nearer  to  Europe. 

3  Because  the  waters  thereabout  abounded  in  codfish.     For  a  compari 
son  of  Gosnold's  route  with  those  of  the  other  early  explorers  see  the 
map  on  p.  15. 

*' Bancroft's  United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  70-83.  Hildreth's  United 
States,  Vol.  I.,  p.  90. 


30  THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 

2.  The  First  Company,  a  band  of  London  merchants,  might 

establish  its  first  settlement  anywhere  between  34°  and 
41°  north  latitude. 

3.  The    Second   Company,   a   band  of   Plymouth   merchants, 

might  establish  its  first  settlement  anywhere  between 
38°  and  45°. 

4.  These  settlements  were  to  be  on  the  seacoast. 

5.  In  order  to  prevent  the  blocks  from  overlapping,  it  was 

provided  that  the  company  which  was  last  to  settle 
should  locate  at  least  100  miles  from  the  other  com 
pany's  settlement.1 

20.  The  Jamestown  Colony.  —  Thus  empowered,  the  two  com 
panies  made  all  haste  to  gather  funds,  collect  stores  and  set 
tlers,  and  fit  out  ships.  The  London  Company  was  the  first  to 
get  ready,  and  on  the  19th  of  December,  1606,  143  colonists 
set  sail  in  three  ships  for  America  with  their  'charter,  and  a 
list  of  the  council  sealed  up  in  a  strong  box.  The  Plymouth 
Company  soon  followed,  and  before  the  year  1607  was  far  ad 
vanced,  two  settlements  were  planted  in  our  country  :  the  one 
at  Jamestown,  in  Virginia,  the  other  near  the  mouth  of  the 
Kennebec,  in  Maine.  The  latter,  however,  was  abandoned  the 
following  year  (see  p.  40). 

The  three  ships  which  carried  the  Virginia  colony  reached 
the  coast  in  the  spring  of  1607,  and  entering  Chesapeake  Bay 
sailed  up  a  river  which  the  colonists  called  the  James,  in  honor 
of  the  King.  When  about  thirty  miles  from  its  mouth,  a 
landing  was  made  on  a  little  peninsula,  where  a  settlement  was 

1  Over  the  affairs  of  each  company  presided  a  council  appointed  by  the 
King,  with  power  to  choose  its  own  president,  fill  vacancies  among  its  own 
members,  and  elect  a  council  of  thirteen  to  reside  on  the  company's  lands 
in  America.  Each  company  might  coin  money,  raise  a  revenue  by  taxing 
foreign  vessels  trading  at  its  ports,  punish  crime,  and  make  laws  which, 
if  bad,  could  be  set  aside  by  the  King.  All  property  was  to  be  owned  in 
common,  and  all  the  products  of  the  soil  deposited  in  a  public  magazine 
from  which  the  needs  of  the  settlers  were  to  be  supplied.  The  surplus 
was  to  be  sold  for  the  good  of  the  company.  The  charter  is  given  in  full 
in  Poore's  Charters  and  Constitutions,  pp.  1888-1893. 


THE  ENGLISH  ON  THE  SEABOARD 


31 


begun  and  named  Jamestown.1  It  was  the  month  of  May,  and 
as  the  weather  was  warm,  the  colonists  did  not  build  houses, 
but,  inside  of  some  rude  fortifications,  put  up  shelters  of  sails 
and  branches  to  serve  till  huts  could  be  built.  But  their  food 
gave  out,  the  Indians  were  hostile,  and  before  September  half 
of  the  party  had  died  of  fever.  Had  it  not  been  for  the  energy 
and  courage  of  John  Smith,  every  one  of  them  would  have  per 
ished.  He  practically  as- 

sumed  command,  set  the 
men  to  building  huts,  per 
suaded  the  Indians  to  give 
them  food,  explored  the 
bays  and  rivers  of  Vir 
ginia,  and  for  two  dreary 
years  held  the  colony  to 
gether.  When  we  con 
sider  the  worthless  men 
he  had  to  deal  with,  and 
the  hardships  and  difficul 
ties  that  beset  him,  his 
work  is  wonderful.  The 
history  which  he  wrote, 
however,  is  not  to  be 
trusted.2 

Bad   as   matters   were, 

All  that  is  left  of  Jamestown 
they  became  worse  when 

a  little  fleet  arrived  with  many  new  settlers,  making  the 
whole  number  about  500.  The  newcomers  were  a  worthless 
set  picked  up  in  the  streets  of  London  or  taken  from  the  jails, 

1  Nothing  now  remains  of  Jamestown  but  the  ruined  tower  of  the  church 
shown  in  the  picture.     Much  of  the  land  on  which  the  town  stood  has 
been  washed  away  by  the  river,  so  that  its  site  is  now  an  island. 

2  Read  the  Life  and  Writings  of  Captain  John  Smith,  by  Charles  Dudley 
Warner;  also  John  Fiske  in  Atlantic  Monthly,  December,  1895;  Eggles- 
ton's  Beginners  of  a  Nation,  pp.  31-38.     Smith's  True  Relation  is  printed 
in  American  History  Leaflets,  No.  27,  and  Library  of  American  Literature, 
Vol.  I. 


THE  ENGLISH  COLONIES 


and  utterly  unfit  to  be 
come  the  founders  of  a 
state  in  the  wilderness 
of  the  New  World.  Out 
of  such  material  Smith 
in  time  might  have 
made  something,  but  he 
was  forced  by  a  wound 
to  return  to  England, 
and  the  colony  went 
rapidly  to  ruin.  Sick 
ness  and  famine  did 
their  work  so  quickly 
that  after  six  months 
there  were  but  sixty 
of  the  500  men  alive. 
Then  two  small  ships, 
under  Sir  Thomas  Gates 
and  Sir  George  Somers, 
arrived  at  Jamestown 
with  more  settlers ;  but 
all  decided  to  flee,  and 
had  actually  sailed  a 
few  miles  down  the 
James,  when,  June  8, 
1610,  they  met  Lord 
Delaware  with  three 
ships  full  of  men  and  supplies  coming  up  the  river.  Delaware 
came  out  as  governor  under  a  new  charter  granted  in  1609.1 

21.  The  Virginia  Charter  of  1609  made  a  great  change  in 
the  boundary  of  the  company's  property.  By  the  1606  charter 
the  colony  was  limited  to  100  miles  along  the  seaboard  and 
100  miles  west  from  the  coast.  In  1609  the  company  was 
given  an  immense  domain  reaching  400  miles  along  the  coast, 

i  Read  "The  Jamestown  Experiments,"  in  Eggleston's  Beginners  of  a 
Nation,  pp.  25-72. 


Vicinity  of  Jamestown 


THE  ENGLISH  ON  THE  SEABOARD 


33 


—  200  miles  each  way  from  Old  Point  Comfort,  —  and  extend 
ing  "up  into  the  land  throughout  from  sea  to  sea,  west  and 
northwest."  This  description  is  very  important,  for  it  was 
afterwards  claimed  by  Virginia  to  mean  a  grant  of  land  of  the 
shape  shown  on  the  ^^ __^^_ 
map.1 

22.  The   First  Rep 
resentative  Assembly  in 
America.  —  Under  the 
new  charter  and  new 
governors  Virginia  be 
gan  to   thrive.     More 
work   and  less   grum 
bling  were  done,  and  a 
few  wise  reforms  were 
introduced.     One  gov 
ernor,     however,     Ar- 
gall,  ruled  the  colony 
so  badly  that  the  peo 
ple  turned  against  him  and  sent  such  reports  to  England  that 
immigration  almost  ceased.     The  company,  in  consequence,  re 
moved  Argall,  and  gave  Virginia  a  better  form  of  government. 
In  future,  the  governor's  power  was  to  be  limited,  and  the 
people  were  to  have  a  share  in  the  making  of  laws  and  the 
management  of  affairs.     As  the  colonists,  now  numbering  4000 
men,  were  living  in  eleven  settlements,  or  "  boroughs,"  it  was 
ordered  that  each  borough  should  elect  two  men  to  sit  in  a 
legislature  to  be  called  the  House  of  Burgesses.     This  house, 
the  first  representative  assembly  ever  held  by  white  men  in 
America,  met  on  July  30,  1619,  in  the  church  at  Jamestown, 
and  there  began  "  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  for 
the  people." 

23.  The  Establishment  of  Slavery  in  America.  — It  is  interest 
ing  to  note  that  at  the  very  time  the  men  of  Virginia  thus 
planted  free  representative  government  in  America,  another 

1  Read  Hinsdale's  Old  Northwest,  pp.  74,  75. 
McM.  HIST.  —  H 


34  THE   ENGLISH  COLONIES 

institution  was  planted  beside  it,  which,  in  the  course  of  two 
hundred  and  fifty  years,  almost  destroyed  free  government. 
The  Burgesses  met  in  July,  and  a  few  weeks  later,  on  an 
August  day,  a  Dutch  ship  entered  the  James  and  before  it 
sailed  away  sold  twenty  negroes  into  slavery.  The  slaves  in 
creased  in  numbers  (there  were  2000  in  Virginia  in  1671),  and 
slavery  spread  to  the  other  colonies  as  they  were  started,  till, 
in  time,  it  existed  in  every  one  of  them. 

24.  Virginia  loses  her  Charter,  1624.  —  The  establishment  of 
popular  government  in  Virginia  was  looked  on  by  King  James 
as  a  direct  affront,  and  was  one  of  many  weighty  reasons  why 
he  decided  to  destroy  the  company.     To  do  this,  he  accused 
it  of  mismanagement,  brought  a  suit  against  it,  and  in  1624 
his  judges  declared  the  charter  annulled,  and  Virginia  became 
a  royal  colony.1 

25.  Maryland  begun. — A  year  later  James  died,  and  Charles  I. 
came  to  the  throne.     As  Virginia  was  now  a  royal  colony, 
the  land  belonged  to  the  King ;  and  as  he  was  at  liberty  to  do 
what  he  pleased  with  it,  he  cut  off  a  piece  and  gave  it  to  Lord 
Baltimore.      George  Calvert,  Lord  Baltimore,  was  a  Roman 
Catholic  nobleman  who  for  years  past  had  been  interested  in 
the  colonization  of  America,  and  had  tried  to  plant  a  colony 
in  Newfoundland.     The  severity  of  the  climate  caused  failure, 
and  in  1629  he  turned  his  attention  to  Virginia  and  visited 
Jamestown.     But  religious  feeling  ran  as  high  there  as  it  did 
anywhere.     The  colonists   were  intolerantly   Protestant,    and 
Baltimore  was  ordered  back  to  England. 

Undeterred  by  such  treatment,  Baltimore  was  more  deter 
mined  than  ever  to  plant  a  colony,  and  in  1632  obtained  his 
grant  of  a  piece  of  Virginia.  The  tract  lay  between  the 
Potomac  River  and  the  fortieth  degree  of  north  latitude,  and 
extended  from  the  Atlantic  Ocean  to  a  north  and  south  line 

1  On  the  Virginia  colony  in  general  read  Doyle's  volume  on  Virginia, 
pp.  104-184  ;  Lodge's  English  Colonies  in  America,  pp.  1-12  ;  of  course, 
Bancroft  and  Hildreth.  For  particular  epochs  or  events  consult  Chan- 
ning  and  Hart's  Guide  to  American  History,  pp.  248-253. 


THE  ENGLISH  ON  THE  SEABOARD 


35 


through  the  source  of  the  Potomac.1     It  was  called  Maryland 
in  honor  of  the  Queen,  Henrietta  Maria. 

The  area  of  the  colony  was  not  large ;  but  the  authority  of 
Lord  Baltimore  over  it  was  almost  boundless.  He  was  to  bring 
to  the  King  each  year,  in  token  of  homage,  two  Indian  arrow 
heads,  and  pay  as  rent  one  tifth  of  all  the  gold  and  silver  mined. 
This  done,  the  "  lord  proprietary,"  as  he  was  called,  was  to  all 
intents  and  purposes  a  king.  He  might  coin  money,  make  war 


ORIGINAL  BOUNDARY 

OF 

MARYLAND 


and  peace,  grant  titles  of  nobility,  establish  courts,  appoint 
judges,  and  pardon  criminals ;  but  he  was  not  permitted  to  tax 
his  people  without  their  consent.  He  must  summon  the  free 
men  to  assist  him  in  making  the  laws ;  but  when  made,  they 
need  not  be  sent  to  the  King  for  approval,  but  went  into  force 
as  soon  as  the  lord  proprietary  signed  them.  Of  course  they 
must  not  be  contrary  to  the  laws  of  England. 

26.   Treatment  of  Catholics.  —  The  deed  for  Maryland  had  not 
been  issued  when  Lord  Baltimore  died.    It  was  therefore  made 

1  It  thus  included  what  is  now  Delaware,  and  pieces  of  Pennsylvania 
and  West  Virginia. 


QOLO 


36  THE   ENGLISH   QOLONIES 

out  in  the  name  of  his  son,  Cecilius  Calvert,  the  second  Lord 
Baltimore,  who,  like  the  first,  was  a  Koman  Catholic,  and  was 
influenced  in  his  attempts  at  colonization  by  a  desire  to  found 
a  refuge  for  people  of  his  own  faith.  At  that  time  in  England 
no  Koman  Catholic  was  permitted  to  educate  his  children  in 
a  foreign  land,  or  to  employ  a  schoolmaster  of  his  religious 
belief;  or  keep  a  weapon  ;  or  have  Catholic  books  in  his  house  ; 
or  sit  in  Parliament  ;  or  when  he  died  be  buried  in  a  parish 
churchyard.  If  he  did  not  attend  the  parish  church,,  he  was 
fined  £20  a  month.  But  it  is  needless  to  mention  the  ways 
in  which  he  suffered  for  his  religion.  It  is  enough  to  know 
that  the  persecution  was  bitter,  and  that  the  purpose  of  Lord 
Baltimore  was  to  make  Maryland  a  Koman  Catholic  colony. 
Yet  he  set  a  noble  example  to  other  founders  of  colonies 
by  freely  granting  to  all  sects  full  freedom  of  conscience. 
As  long  as  the  Catholics  remained  in  control,  toleration 
worked  well.  But  in  the  year  1691  Lord  Baltimore  was  de 
prived  of  his  colony  because  he  had  supported  King  James 
II.,  and  in  1692  sharp  laws  were  made  in  Maryland  against 
Catholics  by  the  Protestants.  In  1716  the  colony  was  re 
stored  to  the  proprietor. 

The  first  settlement  was  made  in  1634  at  St.  Marys.  An 
napolis  was  founded  about  1683  ;  and  Baltimore  in  1729.  * 

27.  The  Dutch  on  the  Hudson.  —  Meantime  great  things  had 
been  happening  to  the  northward.  In  1609  Henry  Hudson,  an 
English  sailor  in  the  service  of  Holland,  was  sent  to  find  a 
northwest  passage  to  India.  He  reached  our  coast  not  far 
from  Portland,  Maine,  and  abandoning  all  idea  of  finding  a 
passage,  he  sailed  alongshore  to  the  southward  as  far  as  Cape 
Cod.  Here  he  put  to  sea,  and  when  he  again  sighted  land  was 
off  Delaware  Bay.  In  attempting  to  sail  up  it,  his  ship,  the 
Half-Moon,  grounded,  and  Hudson  turned  about.  Kunning 
along  the  Jersey  coast,  he  entered  New  York  Bay,  and  sailed 

1  Read  Scharfs  History  of  Maryland;  Doyle's  Virginia,  pp.  275-313  ; 
Lodge's  English  Colonies,  pp.  93-109  ;  Eggleston's  Beginners  of  a 
Nation,  pp.  224-239. 


THE   DUTCH""  <XS"  THE   SEABOARD  37 

up  the  river  which  the  Dutch  called  the  North  Kiver,  but 
which  we  know  as  the  Hudson.  Hudson's  voyage  gave  the 
Dutch  a  claim  to  all  the  country  drained  by  the  Delaware  or 
South  Kiver  and  the  Hudson  Kiver,  and  some  Dutch  traders  at 
once  sent  out  vessels,  and  were  soon  trading  actively  with  the 
Indians.  By  1614  a  rude  fort  had  been  erected  near  the  site 
of  Albany,  and  some  trading  huts  had  been  put  up  on  Manhat 
tan  Island.  These  ventures  proved  so  profitable  that  numbers 
of  merchants  began  to  engage  in  the  trade,  whereupon  those 
already  in  it,  in  order  to  shut  out  others,  organized  a  company, 
and  in  1615  obtained  a  trading  charter  for  three  years  from 
the  States  General  of  Holland,  and  carried  on  their  operations 
from  Albany  to  the  Delaware  Kiver. 


View  of  New  Amsterdam  in  1656 

28.  Dutch  West  India  Company.  —  On  the  expiration  of  the 
charter  (in  1618)  it  was  not  renewed,  but  a  new  corporation, 
the  Dutch  West  India  Company  (1621),  was  created  with 
almost  absolute  political  and  commercial  power  over  all  the 
Dutch  domains  in  North  America,  which  were  called  New 
Netherland.1  In  1624  the  company  began  to  send  out  settlers. 
Some  went  to  Albany,  or,  as  they  called  it,  Fort  Orange. 
Others  were  sent  to  the  South  or  Delaware  Kiver,  where  a 
trading  post,  Fort  Nassau,  was  built  on  the  site  of  Gloucester 
in  New  Jersey.  A  few  went  to  the  Connecticut  Kiver ;  some 
settled  on  Long  Island;  and  others  on  Manhattan  Island,  where 
they  founded  New  Amsterdam,  now  called  New  York  city. 
1  For  map,  see  p.  51. 


38  THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 

All  these  little  settlements  were  merely  fur-trading  posts. 
Nobody  was  engaged  as  yet  in  farming.  To  encourage  this, 
the  company  (in  1629)  took  another  step,  and  offered  a  great 
tract  of  land,  on  any  navigable  river  or  bay,  to  anybody  who 
would  establish  a  colony  of  fifty  persons  above  the  age  of  fif 
teen.  If  on  a  river,  the  domain  was  to  be  sixteen  miles  along 
one  bank  or  eight  miles  along  each  bank,  and  run  back  into 
the  country  as  far  "as  the  situation  of  the  occupiers  will 
admit."  The  proprietor  of  the  land  was  to  be  called  a  "  pa 
troon,"  l  and  was  absolute  ruler  of  whatever  colonies  he  might 
plant,  for  he  was  at  once  owner,  ruler,  and  judge.  It  may  well 
be  supposed  that  such  a  tempting  offer  did  not  go  a-begging, 
and  a  number  of  patroons  were  soon  settled  along  the  Hudson 
and  on  the  banks  of  the  Delaware  (1631),  where  they  founded 
a  town  near  Lewes.  The  settlements  on  the  Delaware  River 
were  short-lived.  The  settlers  quarreled  with  the  Indians,  who 
in  revenge  massacred  them  and  drove  off  the  garrison  at  Fort 
Nassau ;  whereupon  the  patroons  sold  their  rights  to  the  Dutch 
West  India  Company.2 

29.  The  Struggle  for  the  Delaware ;  the  Swedes  on  the  Dela 
ware.  —  And  now  began  a  bitter  contest  for  the  ownership  of 
the  country  bordering  the  Delaware.  A  few  leading  officials 
of  the  Dutch  Company,  disgusted  at  the  way  its  affairs  were 
managed,  formed  a  new  company  under  the  lead  of  William 
Usselinx.  As  they  could  not  get  a  charter  from  Holland,  for 
she  would  not  create  a  rival  to  the  Dutch  Company,  they  sought 

1  The  patroon  bound  himself  to  (1)  transport  the  fifty  settlers  to  New 
Netherland  at  his  own  expense  ;  (2)  provide  each  of  them  with  a  farm 
stocked  with  horses,  cattle,  and  farming  implements,  and  charge  a  low 
rent ;  (3)  employ  a  schoolmaster  and  a  minister  of  the  Gospel.     In  return 
for  this  the  emigrant  bound  himself  (1)  to  stay  and  cultivate  the  land 
of  the  patroon  for  ten  years  ;  (2)  to  bring  his  grain  to  the  patroon's 
mill  and  pay  for  grinding  ;  (3)  to  use  no  cloth  not  made  in  Holland  ; 
(4)  to  sell  no  grain  or  produce  till  the  patroon  had  been  given  a  chance  to 
buy  it. 

2  Lodge's  English  Colonies,  pp.  295-311  ;  Winsor's  Narrative  and  Crit 
ical  History,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  385-411 ;    Bancroft's  History  of  the  United 
States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  501-508. 


THE   SWEDES   ON   THE   SEABOARD  39 

and  obtained  one  from  Sweden  as  the  South  Company,  and 
(1638)  sent  out  a  colony  to  settle  on  the  Delaware  River.1  The 
spot  chosen  was  on  the  site  of  Wilmington.  The  country 
was  named  New  Sweden,  though  it  belonged  to  Maryland. 
The  Dutch  West  India  Company  protested  and  rebuilt  Fort 
Nassau.  The  Swedes,  in  retaliation,  went  farther  up  the 
river  and  fortified  an  island  near  the  mouth  of  the  Schuyl- 
kill.  Had  they  stopped  here,  all  would  have  gone  well. 
But,  made  bold  by  the  inaction  of  the  Dutch,  they  began 
to  annoy  the  New  Netherlander,  till  (1655)  Peter  Stuyve- 
sant,  the  governor  of  New  Netherland,  unable  to  stand 
it  any  longer,  came  over  from  New  Amsterdam  with  a  few 
hundred  men,  overawed  the  Swedes,  and  annexed  their  ter 
ritory  west  of  the  Delaware.  New  Sweden  then  became 
part  of  New  Netherland.2 

SUMMARY 

1.  After  the  discovery  of  the  North  American  coast  by  the  Cabots,  Eng 

land  made  no  attempt  to  settle  it  for  nearly  eighty  years  ;  and  even 
then  the  colonies  planted  by  Gilbert  and  Ralegh  were  failures. 

2.  Successful  settlement  by  the  English  began  under  the  London  Com 

pany  in  1607. 

3.  In  1609  the  London  Company  obtained  a  grant  of  land  from  sea  to 

sea,  and  extending  400  miles  along  the  Atlantic  ;  but  in  1624  its 
charter  was  annulled,  and  in  1632  the  King  carved  the  proprietary 
colony  of  Maryland  out  of  Virginia. 

4.  Meantime  Henry  Hudson,  in  the  employ  of  the  Dutch,  discovered  the 

Delaware  and  Hudson  rivers  (1609),  and  the  Dutch,  ignoring  the 
claims  of  England,  planted  colonies  on  these  rivers  and  called  the 
country  New  Netherland. 

5.  Then  a  Swedish  company  began  to  colonize  the  Delaware  Bay  and 

River  coast  of  Virginia,  which  they  called  New  Sweden. 

6.  Conflicts  between  the  Dutch  and  the  Swedes  followed,  and  in  1655 

New  Sweden  was  made  a  part  of  New  Netherland. 

1  Sweden  had  no  right  to  make  such  a  settlement.     She  had  no  claim 
to  any  territory  in  North  America. 

2  Lodge's  English  Colonies,  pp.  205-210 ;  Bancroft's  History  of  the 
United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  509,  510;  Hildreth's  History  of  the  United 
States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  413-442. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE   PLANTING  OF   NEW  ENGLAND 

30.  The  Beginnings  of   New  England.  —  When   the   Dutch 
put  up  their  trading  posts  where  New  York  and  Albany  now 
stand,  all  the  country  east  of  New  York,  all  of  what  is  now 
New  England,  was  a  wilderness.  .  As  early  as  1607  an  attempt 
was  made  to  settle  it  and  a  colony  was  planted  on  the  coast  of 
Maine  by  two  members  of  the  Plymouth  Company,  Sir  John 
Popham,  Lord  Chief  Justice  of  England,  and  Sir  Ferdinando 
Gorges,  governor  of  Plymouth.     But  the  colonists  were  half 
starved  and  frozen,  and  in  the  spring  of  1608  gladly  went 
home  to  England. 

Six  years  later  John  Smith,  the  hero  of  Virginia,  explored 
and  mapped  the  coast  from  the  Penobscot  to  Cape  Cod.  He 
called  the  country  New  England;  one  of  the  rivers,  the 
Charles;  and  two  of  the  promontories,  Cape  Elizabeth  and 
Cape  Ann.  Three  times  he  attempted  to  lead  out  a  colony ; 
but  that  work  was  reserved  for  other  men. 

31.  The  Separatists.  —  The  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth  had 
witnessed  in  England  the  rise  of  a  religious  sect  which  in 
sisted  that  certain  changes  should  be  made  in  the  government 
and  ceremonials  of  the  Established  or  State  Church  of  England. 
This  they  called  purifying  the  Church,  and  in  consequence  they 
were  themselves  called  Puritans.1    At  first  they  did  not  intend 
to  form  a  new  sect;  but  in  1580  one  of  their  ministers,  named 
Robert  Brown,  urged  them  to  separate  from  the  Church  of 

1  Read  Fiske's  Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  50-71.  The  teacher 
may  read  "  Rise  and  Development  of  Puritanism"  in  Eggleston's  Begin 
ners  of  a  Nation,  pp.  98-140. 

40 


THE  PLANTING  OF  NEW  ENGLAND        41 

England,  and  soon  gathered  about  him  a  great  number  of  fol 
lowers,  who  were  called  Separatists  or  Brownists.  They 
boldly  asserted  their  right  to  worship  as  they  pleased,  and 
put  their  doctrines  into  practice.  So  hot  a  persecution  fol 
lowed,  that  in  1608  a  party,  led  by  William  Brewster  and 
John  Robinson,  fled  from  Scrooby,  a  little  village  in  northern 
England,  to  Amsterdam,  in  Holland;  but  soon  went  on  to 
Ley  den,  where  they  dwelt  eleven  years.1 

32.  Why  the  Separatists  went  to  New  England.  —  They  had 
come  to  Holland  as  an  organized  community,  practicing 
English  manners  and  customs.  For  a  temporary  residence 
this  would  do.  But  if  they  and  their  children's  children  after 
them  were  to  remain  and  prosper,  they  must  break  up  their 
organization,  forget  their  native  land,  their  native  speech, 
their  national  traditions,  and  to  all  intents  and  purposes  be 
come  Dutch.  This  they  could  not  bring  themselves  to  do, 
and  by  1617  they  had  fully  determined  to  remove  to  some  land 
where  they  might  still  continue  to  be  Englishmen,  and  where 
they  might  lay  the  foundations  of  a  Christian  state.  But 
one  such  land  could  then  be  found,  and  that  was  America. 
To  America,  therefore,  they  turned  their  attention,  and  after 
innumerable  delays  formed  a  company  and  obtained  leave 
from  the  London  Company  to  settle  on  the  coast  of  what  is 
now  New  Jersey.2 

This  done,  Brewster  and  Bradford  and  Miles  Standish,  with 
a  little  band,  sent  out  as  an  advance  guard,  set  sail  from  the 
Dutch  port  of  Delft  Haven  in  July,  1620,  in  the  ship  Speedwell 
The  first  run  was  to  Southampton,  England,  where  some 
friends  from  London  joined  them  in  the  Mayflower,  and 
whence,  August  5,  they  sailed  for  America.  But  the  Speed 
well  proved  so  unseaworthy  that  the  two  ships  put  back  to 
Plymouth,  where  twenty  people  gave  up  the  voyage.  Sep- 

1  Read    Eggleston's    Beginners  of  a   Nation,   pp.    141-157 ;    Fiske's 
Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  71-80 ;  Doyle's  Puritan  Colonies,  Vol. 
I.,  pp.  47-81 ;  Palfrey's  New  England,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  176-232. 

2  Eggleston's  Beginners  of  a  Nation,  pp.  159-176. 


42 


THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 


tember  6,  1620,  such  as  remained  steadfast,  just  102  in  num 
ber,  reembarked  on  the  Mayflower  and  began  the  most  mem 
orable  of  voyages.  The  weather  was  so  foul,  and  the  wind 
and  sea  so  boisterous,  that  nine  weeks  passed  before  they 
beheld  the  sandy  shores  of  Cape  Cod.  Having  no  right  to 
settle  there,  as  the  cape  lay  far  to  the  northward  of  the  lands 


The  Mayflower  i 

owned  by  the  London  Company,  they  turned  their  ship  south 
ward  and  attempted  to  go  on.  But  head  winds  drove  them 
back  and  forced  them  to  seek  shelter  in  Provincetown  harbor, 
at  the  end  of  Cape  Cod. 

33.   The  Mayflower  Compact.  —  Since  it  was  then  the  llth  of 
November,  the  Pilgrims,  as  they  are  now  called,  decided  to 

1  From  the  model  in  the  National  Museum,  Washington. 


THE  PLANTING  OF  NEW  ENGLAND 


43 


THE 


Cape  Ann      MASS A CHUSETTS 


COAST 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


vJ^*»i*£"*- 

BAY 


I 


get  permission  from  the  Plymouth  Company  to  remain  per 
manently.  But  certain  members  of  the  party,  when  they 
heard  this,  became  unruly,  and  declared  that  as  they  were  not 
to  land  in  Virginia,  they  were  no  longer  bound  by  the  con 
tracts  they  had  made  in  England  regarding  their  emigration  to 
Virginia.  To  put  an  end  to  this,  a  meeting  was  held,  Novem 
ber  21,  1620,  in  the  cabin  of  the  Mayflower,  and  a  compact 
was  drawn  up  and  signed.1  It  declared 

1.    That  they  were  loyal  subjects  of  the  King. 

1  The  compact  is  in  Poore's  Charters  and  Constitutions,  p.  931,  and 
in  Preston's  Documents  Illustrative  of  American  History,  pp.  29-31. 
Read,  by  all  means,  Webster's  Plymouth  Oration. 


44 


THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 


2.  That  they  had  undertaken  to  found  a  colony  in  the  northern 

parts  of  Virginia,  and  now  bound  themselves  to  form  a 
"civil  body  politic." 

3.  That   they  would  frame  such  just  and  equal  laws,  from 

time  to  time,  as  might  be  for  the  general  good. 

4.  And  to  these  laws  they  promised  "all  due  submission  and 

obedience." 

34.    The  Founding  of  Plymouth.  —  The  selection  of  a  site  for 
their  home  was  now  necessary,  and  five  weeks  were  passed  in 

exploring  the  coast  before  Cap 
tain  Standish  with  a  boatload  of 
men  entered  the  harbor  which 
John  Smith  had  noted  on  his  map 
and  named  Plymouth.  On  the 
sandy  shore  of  that  harbor,  close 
to  the  water's  edge,  was  a  little 
granite  bowlder,  and  on  this,  ac 
cording  to  tradition,  the  Pilgrims 
stepped  as  they  came  ashore,  De 
cember  21,  1620.  To  this  harbor 
the  Mayflower  was  brought,  and 
the  work  of  founding  Plymouth 
was  begun.  The  winter  was  a 
dreadful  one,  and  before  spring 
fifty-one  of  the  colonists  had  died.1  But  the  Pilgrims  stood 
fast,  and  in  1621  obtained  a  grant  of  land 2  from  the  Council 
for  ISTew  England,  which  had  just  succeeded  the  Plymouth 
Company,  under  a  charter  giving  it  control  between  latitudes 
40°  and  48°,  from  sea  to  sea.3  It  was  from  the  same  Council 

1  In  the  trying  times  which  followed,  William  Bradford  \\as  chosen  gov 
ernor  and  many  times  reflected.    lie  wrote  the  so-called  "  Log  of  the  May 
flower,"  —  really  a  manuscript  History  of  the  Plymouth  Plantation  from 
1002  to  1647,  — a  fragment  of  which  is  reproduced  on  the  opposite  page. 

2  This  grant  had  no  boundary.      Each  settler  might  have  100  acres. 
Fifteen  hundred  acres  were  set  aside  for  public  buildings. 

8  Fiske's  Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  80-87  ;  Palfrey's  New  Eng 
land,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  176-232;  Thatcher's  History  of  the  Town  of  Plymouth. 


Plymouth  Rock 


'/I 


*n  -fro  Ais  ccnc-ien/s 


«  Cc^fe  ofj  ttpflGj 
nite*fiL<£  Ce/SnA 
Men  £>e 


gc8.~/r<trtixCt  tr.fn.)  ye.pt  • 

Sy  WtVft  -woJ^S.  cjpt.c?s  fiSff-mtki  tcs  -n 


,  tutu 


$ff  At  T^  /'«7tC<  t«A  A'»tec,.46 


46  THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 

that  for  fifteen  years  to  come  all  other  settlers  in  New  England 
obtained  their  rights  to  the  soil. 

35.  A  Puritan  Colony  proposed.  —  Among  those  who  obtained 
such  rights  was  a  company  of  Dorchester  merchants  who  planted 
a  town  on  Cape  Ann.    The  enterprise  failed,  and  the  colonists 
went  off  and  settled  at  a  place  they  called  Naumkeag.     But 
there  was  one  man  in  Dorchester  who  was  not  discouraged  by 
failure.     He  was  John  White,  a  Puritan  rector.     What  had 
been  done  by  the  Separatists  in  a  small  way  might  be  done,  it 
seemed  to  White,  on  a  great  scale  by  an  association  of  wealthy 
and  influential  Puritans.     The  matter  was  discussed  by  them 
in  London,  and  in  1628  an  association  was  formed,  and  a  tract 
of  land  was  bought  from  the  Council  for  New  England. 

36.  The  uSea  to  Sea"  Grant.  —  Concerning  the  interior   of 
our   continent  absolutely  nothing  was   known.     Nobody  sup 
posed  it  was  more  than  half   as  wide  as  it  really  is.     The 
grant  to  the  association,  therefore,  stretched  from  three  miles 
north  of  the  Merrimac  River  to  three  miles  south  of  the  Charles 
River,  along  these  rivers  to  their  sources,  and  then  westward 
across  the  continent  from  sea  to  sea.1 

As  soon  as  the  grant  was  obtained,  John  Endicott  came  out 
with  a  company  of  sixty  persons,  and  took  up  his  abode  at 
Naumkeag,  which,  being  an  Indian  and  therefore  a  pagan 
name,  he  changed  to  Salem,  the  Hebrew  word  for  '-peace." 

37.  The  Massachusetts  Charter,  1629.  —  The  next  step  was  to 
obtain  the  right  of  self-government,  which  was  secured  by  a 
royal  charter  creating  a  corporation  known  as  the  Governor 
and  Company  of  Massachusetts  Bay  in  New  England.     Over 
the  affairs  of  the  company  were  to  preside  a  governor,  deputy 
governor,  and  a  council  of  eighteen  to  be  elected  annually  by 
the  members  of  the  company.2 

1  You  will  notice  that  when  this  grant  was  made  in  1628  the  Dutch  had 
discovered  the  Hudson,  and  had  begun  to  settle  Albany.     To  this  region 
(the  Hudson  and  Mohawk  valleys)  the  English  had  no  just  claim. 

2  The  charter  is  printed  in  Poore's  Charters  and  Constitutions,  pp. 
932-942,  and  in  Preston's  Documents,  pp.  36-61. 


THE   PLANTING   OF   NEW   ENGLAND  47 

Six  ships  were  now  fitted  out,  and  in  them  406  men,  women, 
and  children,  with  140  head  of  cattle,  set  sail  for  Massachusetts. 
They  reached  Salem  in  safety  and  made  it  the  largest  colony  in 
New  England. 

38.  Why  the  Puritans  came  to  New  England.  —  It  was  in  1625 
that  Charles  I.  ascended  the  throne  of  England.      Under  him 
the  quarrel  with  the  Puritans  grew  worse  each  year.    He  vio 
lated  his   promises,  he  collected  illegal  taxes,  he  quartered 
troops  on  the  people,  he  threw  those  into  prison  who  would 
not  contribute  to  his  forced  loans,  or  pressed  them  into  the 
army  or  the  navy.     His  Archbishop  Laud  persecuted  the  Puri 
tans  with  shameful  cruelty. 

Little  wonder  then  that  in  1629  twelve  leading  Puritans 
met  in  consultation  and  agreed  to  head  a  great  migration 
to  the  New  World,  provided  the  charter  and  the  government 
of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Company  were  both  removed  to 
New  England.  This  was  agreed  to,  and  in  April,  1630,  John 
Winthrop  sailed  with  nearly  one  thousand  Puritans  for  Salem. 
From  Salem  he  moved  to  Charlestown,  and  later  in  the  year 
(1630)  to  a  little  three-hilled  peninsula,  which  the  English  called 
Tri-mountain  or  Tremont.  There  a  town  was  founded  and 
called  Boston. 

The  departure  of  Winthrop  was  the  signal,  and  before  the 
year  1630  ended,  seventeen  ships,  bringing  fifteen  hundred 
Puritans,  reached  Massachusetts.  The  newcomers  settled 
Charlestown,  Boston,  Roxbury,  Dorchester,  Watertown,  and 
Newtown  (now  Cambridge).  New  England  was  planted.1 

39.  New  Hampshire  and  Maine.  —  When  it  became  apparent 
that  the  Plymouth  colony  was  permanently  settled,  Sir  Fer- 
dinando  Gorges,  whose  interest  in  New  England  had  never 
lagged,  together  with  John  Mason  obtained  (1622)  from  the 
Council  for  New  England  a  grant  of  Laconia,  as  they  called 
the  territory  between  the  Merrimac  and  the  Kennebec  rivers, 
and  from  the  Atlantic  "to  the  great  river  of  Canada."     Seven 

1  Read  Fiske's  Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  75-105.  Eggleston's 
Beginners  of  a  Nation,  pp.  188-219. 


48  THE   ENGLISH  COLONIES 

years  later  (1629)  they  divided  their  property.  Mason,  taking 
the  territory  between  the  Merrimac  and  Piscataqua  rivers, 
called  it  New  Hampshire  because  he  was  Lord  Lieutenant  of 
Hampshire  in  England.  Gorges  took  the  region  between  the 
Piscataqua  and  the  Kennebec,  and  called  it  Maine.  After 
the  death  of  Mason  (1635)  his  colony  was  neglected  and  from 
1641  to  1679  was  annexed  to  Massachusetts.  The  King  sepa 
rated  them  in  1679,  joined  them  again  in  1688,  and  finally 
parted  them  in  1691,  making  New  Hampshire  a  royal  colony. 

Gorges  took  better  care  of  his  part  and  (in  1639)  was  given 
a  charter  with  the  title  of  Lord  Proprietor  of  the  Province 
or  County  of  Maine,  which  extended,  as  before,  from  the 
Piscataqua  to  the  Kennebec,  and  backward  120  miles  from  the 
ocean.  But  after  his  death  the  province  fell  into  neglect,  and 
the  towns  were  gradually  absorbed  by  Massachusetts,  which, 
in  1677,  bought  the  claims  of  the  heir  of  Gorges  for  £1250  and 
governed  Maine  as  lord  proprietor  under  the  Gorges  charter. 

40.  Church  and  State  in  Massachusetts.  —  Down  to  the 
moment -of  their  arrival  in  America  the  Puritans  had  not 
been  •  Separatists.  They  were  still  members  of  the  Church 
of  England  who  desired  to  see  her  form  of  worship  purified. 
But  the  party  under  Endicott  had  no  sooner  reached  Salem 
than  they  seceded,  and  the  first  Congregational  Church  in  New 
England  was  founded. 

Some  in  Salem  were  not  prepared  for  so  radical  a  step, 
and  attempted  to  establish  a  church  on  the  episcopal  model ; 
but  Endicott  promptly  sent  two  of  the  leaders  back  to  Eng 
land.  Thus  were  established  two  facts :  1 .  The  separation 
or  secession  of  the  Colonial  Church  from  that  of  England. 
2.  That  the  episcopal  form  of  worship  would  not  be  tolerated 
in  the  colony. 

In  1631  another  step  was  taken  which  united  church  and 
state,  for  it  was  then  ordered  that  "  no  man  shall  be  admitted 
to  the  freedom  of  this  body  politic,  but  such  as  are  members 
of  some  of  the  churches  within  the  limits  of  the  same." 

This  was  intolerance  of  the  grossest  kind,  and  soon  became 


THE  PLANTING  OF  NEW  ENGLAND         49 

the  cause  of  troubles  which  led  to  the  founding  of  Rhode 
Island  and  Connecticut. 

41.  The  Planting  of  Rhode  Island.  —  There  came  to  Salem 
(from  Plymouth),  in  1633,  a  young  minister  named  lloger 
Williams.  He  dissented  heartily  from  the  intolerance  of  the 
people  of  Massachusetts,  and,  though  a  minister  of  the  Salem 
church,  insisted 

1.  On  the  separation  of  church  and  state. 

2.  On  the  toleration  of  all  religious  beliefs. 

3.  On  the  repeal  of  all  laws  requiring  attendance  on  religious 

worship. 

To  us,  in  this  century,  the  justice  of  each  of  these  principles 
is  self-evident.  But  in  the  seventeenth  century  there  was  no 
country  in  the  world  where  it  was  safe  to  declare  them.  For 
doing  so  in  some  parts  of  Europe,  a  man  would  most  certainly 
have  been  burned  at  the  stake.  For  doing  so  in  England, 
he  would  have  been  put  in  the  pillory,  or  had  his  ears  cut  off, 
or  been  sent  to  jail.  That  Williams's  teachings  should  seem 
rank  heresy  in  New  England  was  quite  natural.  But,  to  make 
matters  worse,  he  wrote  a  pamphlet  in  which  he  boldly  stated 

1.  That  the  soil  belonged  to  the  Indians. 

2.  That  the  settlers  could  obtain  a  valid  title  only  by  purchase 

from  the  Indians. 

3.  That  accepting  a  deed  for  the  land  from  a  mere  intruder 

like  the  King  of  England  was  a  sin  requiring  public 
repentance. 

In  the  opinion  of  the  people  of  New  England  such  doctrine 
could  not  fail  to  bring  down  on  Massachusetts  the  wrath  of 
the  King.  When,  therefore,  a  little  later,  Endicott  cut  the  red 
cross  of  St.  George  out  of  the  colors  of  the  Salem  militia,  the 
people  considered  his  act  a  defiance  of  royal  authority,  attrib 
uted  it  to  the  teachings  of  Williams,  and  proceeded  to  punish 
both.  Endicott  was  rebuked  by  the  General  Court  (or  legis 
lature)  and  forbidden  to  hold  office  for  a  year.  Williams  was 
McM.  HIST.  —  4 


50  THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 

ordered  to  go  back  to  England.  But  he  fled  to  the  woods,  and 
made  his  way  through  the  snow  to  the  wigwam  of  the  Indian 
chief,  Massasoit,  on  Narragansett  Bay,  and  there  in  the  summer 
of  1636  he  founded  Providence.  About  the  same  time  another 
teacher  of  what  was  then  thought  heresy,  Anne  Hutchinson, 
was  driven  from  Massachusetts,  and  with  some  of  her  followers 
went  southward  and  founded  Portsmouth  and  Newport,  on  the 
island  of  Rhode  Island.  For  a  while  each  of  these  settlements 
was  independent,  but  in  1643  Williams  went  to  London  and 
secured  a  patent  from  Parliament  which  united  them  under 
the  name  of  "  The  Incorporation  of  Providence  Plantations  on 
the  Narragansett  Bay  in  New  England." 

42.  Connecticut  begun.  —  In  the  same  year  that  Roger  Wil 
liams   began  his   settlement  at  Providence,  several   hundred 
people  from  the  towns  near  Boston  went  off  and  settled  in  the 
Connecticut  valley.    For  a  long  time  past  there  had  been  grow 
ing  up  in  Massachusetts  a  strong  feeling  that  the  law  that  none 
but  church  members  should  vote  or  hold  office  was  oppressive. 
This   feeling    became    so   strong   that    in    1635   some    hardy 
pioneers  from  Dorchester  pushed  through  the  wilderness  and 
settled  at  Windsor.     A  party  from  Watertown  went  further 
and  settled  Wethersfield.     These  were  small  movements.    But 
in  1636  the  Newtown  congregation,  led  by  its  pastor,  Thomas 
Hooker,  walked  to  the  Connecticut  valley  and  founded  Hartford. 
The  congregations  of  the  Dorchester  and  Watertown  churches 
soon  followed,  while  a  party  from  Roxbury  settled  at  Spring 
field.    During  three  years  these  four  towns  were  part  of  Massa 
chusetts.     But  in  1639,  Windsor,  Hartford,  and  Wethersfield 
adopted  a  constitution  and  formed  a  little  republic  which  in 
time  was   called  Connecticut.      Their  "Fundamental  Orders 
of  Connecticut"  was  the  first  written  constitution  made  in 
America.     Their  republic  was  the  first  in  the  history  of  the 
world  to  be  founded  by  a  written  constitution,  and  marks  the 
beginning  of  democratic  government  in  our  country. 

43.  The  New  Haven  Colony.  —  Just  at  the  time  these  things 
were  happening  in  the  Connecticut  valley,  the  beginnings  of 


THE   PLANTING   OF   NEW   ENGLAND 


51 


another  little  republic  were  made  on  the  shores  of  Long  Island 
Sound.  One  day  in  the  summer  of  1637  there  came  to  Boston 
a  company  of  rich  London  merchants  under  the  lead  of  an  elo 
quent  preacher  named  John  Davenport.  The  people  of  Boston 
would  gladly  have  kept  the  newcomers  at  that  town.  But  the 
strangers  desired  to  found  a  state  of  their 
own,  and  so,  after  spending  some  months 
in  seeking  for  a  spot  with  a  good  harbor, 
they  left  Boston  in  1638  and  founded 
New  Haven.  In  1639  Milford  and  Guil- 
ford  were  laid  out,  and  Stamford  was 
started  in  1640.  Three  years  later  these 
four  towns  joined 
in  a  sort  of  fed 
eral  union  and 
took  the  name  of 
the  New  Haven 
colony.1 


44.  "The  United  Colonies  of  New  England."  —  There  were 
now  five  colonies  in  New  England ;  namely,  Plymouth,  or  the 
•"•Old  Colony,"  Massachusetts  Bay,  Ehode  Island,  Connecticut, 
and  New  Haven.  Geographically,  they  were  near  each  other. 
But  each  was  weak  in  numbers,  and  if  left  without  the 
1  Fiske's  Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  134-137. 


52  THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 

aid  of  its  neighbors,  might  easily  have  fallen  a  prey  to  some 
enemy.  Of  this  the  settlers  were  well  aware,  and  in  1643 
four  of  the  colonies,  Plymouth,  Massachusetts  Bay,  Connecti 
cut,  and  New  Haven l  united  for  defense  against  the  Indians 
and  the  Dutch,  who  claimed  the  Connecticut  valley  and  so 
threatened  the  English  colonies  on  the  west. 

The  name  of  this  league  was  "  The  United  Colonies  of  New 
England,"  and  it  was  the  first  attempt  in  America  at  federal 
government.  All  its  affairs  were  managed  by  a  board  of  eight 
commissioners,  —  two  from  each  colony,  —  who  must  be  church 
members.  They  had  no  power  to  lay  taxes  or  to  meddle  with 
the  internal  concerns  of  the  colonies,  but  they  had  entire  con 
trol  over  all  dealings  with  Indians  or  with  foreign  powers. 

45.  The  Year  1643. — The  year  1643  is  thus  an  important 
one  in  colonial  history.     It  was  in  that  year  that  the  New 
Haven  colony  was  founded;  that  the  league  of  The  United 
Colonies  of  New  England  was  formed;  and  that  Roger  Wil 
liams  obtained  the  first  charter  of  Rhode  Island. 

46.  New  Charters.  —  During  the  next  twenty  years  no  changes 
took  place  in  the  boundaries  of  the  colonies.     This  was  the 
period  of  the  Civil  War  in  England,  of  the  Commonwealth, 
of  the  rule  of  Cromwell  and  the  Puritans ;  and  affairs  in  New 
England  were  left  to  take  care  of  themselves.     But  in  1660 
Charles  II.  was  restored  to  the  throne  of  England,  and  a  new 
era  opens  in  colonial  history.     In  1661  the  little  colony  of  Con 
necticut  promptly  acknowledged  the  restoration  of  Charles  II. 
and  applied  for  a  charter.      The  application  was  more  than 
granted ;  for  to  Connecticut  (1662)  was  giv.en  not  only  a  charter 
and  an  immense  tract  of  land,  but  also  the  colony  of   New 
Haven.2    The  land  grant  was  comprised  in  a  strip  that  stretched 

1  Rhode  Island  was  not  allowed  to  come  in,  for  the  feeling  against  the 
followers  of  Koger  Williams  and  Anne  Hutchinson  was  still  very  strong. 

2  In  1660,  after  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.,  Edward  Whalley  and 
William  Goffe  (the  regicides,  "king-killers,"  as  they  were  called),  two  of 
the  judges  who  had  condemned  Charles  I.  to  be  beheaded,  fled  to  New 
Haven  and  were  protected  by  the  people.     This  act  had  much  to  do  with 
the  annexation  of  New  Haven  to  Connecticut. 


THE  PLANTING  OF  NEW  ENGLAND         53 

across  the  continent  from  Rhode  Island  to  the  Pacific  and  was 
as  wide  as  the  present  state.1  In  1663  Ehode  Island  was  given 
a  new  charter. 

In  1684  the  King's  judges  declared  the  Massachusetts  charter 
void,  and  James  II.  was  about  to  make  New  England  one  royal 
colony,  when  the  English  people  drove  him  from  the  throne. 
William  and  Mary  in  1691  granted  a  new  charter  and  united 
the  Plymouth  colony,  Massachusetts,  Maine,  and  Nova  Scotia, 
in  one  colony  called  Massachusetts  Bay.  This  charter  was  in 
force  when  the  Revolution  opened. 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  first  colony  established  by  the  Plymouth  Company  (1607,  on  the 

coast  of  Maine)  was  a  failure. 

2.  Captain  John  Smith  explored  the  New  England  coast  and  mapped  it 

(1613),  but  did  not  succeed  in  planting  any  colonies. 

3.  The  permanent  settlement  of  New  England  began  with  the  arrival  of 

a  body  of  Separatists  in  the  Mayflower  (1620),  who  founded  the 
colony  of  Plymouth. 

4.  The  Separatist  migration  from  England  was  followed  in  a  few  years 

by  a  great  exodus  of  Puritans,  who  planted  towns  along  the  coast  to 
the  north  of  Plymouth,  and  obtained  a  charter  of  government  and  a 
great  strip  of  land,  and  founded  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay. 

5.  Religious  disputes  drove  Roger  Williams  and  Anne  Hutchinson  out  of 

Massachusetts,  and  led  to  the  founding  of  Rhode  Island  (1636). 

6.  Other  church  wrangles  led  to  an  emigration  from  Massachusetts  to  the 

Connecticut  valley,  where  a  little  confederacy  of  towns  was  created 
and  called  Connecticut. 

7.  Some  settlers  from  England  went  to  Long  Island  Sound  and  there 

founded  four  towns  which,  in  their  turn,  joined  in  a  federal  union 
called  the  New  Haven  Colony. 

8.  In  time,  New  Haven  was  joined  to  Connecticut,  and  Plymouth  and 

Maine  to  Massachusetts  ;  New  Hampshire  was  made  a  royal  colony  ; 
and  the  four  New  England  colonies  —  Massachusetts,  New  Hamp 
shire,  Rhode  Island,  and  Connecticut  —  were  definitely  established. 

9.  The  territory  of  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut  stretched  across  the 

continent  to  the  "  South  Sea,"  or  Pacific  Ocean. 

1  Read  Fiske's  Beginnings  of  New  England,  pp.  192-106.  Many  of 
the  New  Haven  colonists  were  disgusted  by  the  union  of  their  colony  with 
Connecticut,  and  in  June,  1667,  migrated  to  New  Jersey,  where  they 
founded  "Now- Ark"  or  Newark. 


CHAPTER  V 


THE  MIDDLE  AND  SOUTHERN  COLONIES 

47.  North  and  South  Carolina.  —  You  remember  that  away 
back  in  the  sixteenth  century  the  French  under  Jean  Ribault 
and  the  English  under  Ralegh  undertook  to  plant  colonies  on 

what  is  now  the 
Carolina  coast.  They 
failed,  and  the  coun 
try  remained  a  wil 
derness  till  1653, 
when  a  band  of  emi 
grants  from  Virginia 
made  the  first  per 
manent  settlement 
on  the  banks  of  the 
Chowan  and  the 
Roanoke.  In  1663 
some  Englishmen 
from  Barbados  be 
gan  to  settle  on  the 
Cape  Fear  River, 

just  at  the  time  when  Charles  II.  of  England  gave  the  region 
to  eight  English  noblemen,  who,  out  of  compliment  to  the 
King,  allowed  the  name  of  Carolina  given  it  by  Ribault  to 
remain.  In  1665  the  bounds  were  enlarged,  and  Carolina  then 
extended  from  latitude  30°  00'  to  36°  30',  the  present  south 
boundary  of  Virginia,  and  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific. 
There  was  at  first  no  intention  of  dividing  the  territory, 
although,  after  Charleston  was  founded  (1670),  North  Carolina 
and  South  Carolina  sometimes  had  separate  governors.  But 

64 


CAROLINA 

AS  GRANTED  BY 

Kin?  Charles  II 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


THE  MIDDLE  AND  SOUTHERN  COLONIES       55 

in  1729  the  proprietors  sold  Carolina  to  the  King,  and  it  was 
then  divided  into  two  distinct  and  separate  royal  provinces. 

48.  New  York.  —  An  event  of  far  greater  importance  than 
the  chartering  of  Carolina  wras  the  seizure  of  New  Nether- 
land.      After  the  conquest  of  New  Sweden,  in  1655,  the  pos 
sessions  and  claims  of  the  Dutch  in  our  country  extended  from 
the  Connecticut  Eiver  to  the  Delaware  Eiver,  and  from  the 
Mohawk   to   Delaware    Bay.      Geographically,   they   cut   the 
English  colonies  in  two,  and  hampered  communication  between 
New  England  and  the  South.     To  own  this  region  was  there 
fore  of  the  utmost  importance  to  the  English ;  and  to  get  it, 
King  Charles   II.,  in   1664,  revived  the  old  claim   that   the 
English  had  discovered  the  country  before  the  Dutch,  and  he 
sent  a  little  fleet  and  army,  which  appeared  off  New  Amster 
dam  and  demanded  its  surrender.     The  demand  was  complied 
with ;  and  in  1664  Dutch  rule  in  our  country  ended,  and  Eng 
land  owned  the  seaboard  from  the  Kennebec  to  the  Savannah. 

The  King  had  already  granted  New  Netherland  to  his 
brother  the  Duke  of  York,  in  honor  of  whom  the  town  of  New 
Amsterdam  was  now  renamed  New  York. 

49.  New  Jersey.  —  The  Duke  of  York  no  sooner  received  his 
province  than  he  gave  so  much  of  it  as  lay  between  the  Dela 
ware  and  the  ocean   to   his   friends  Lord   Berkeley  and   Sir 
George  Carteret,  and  called  it  New  Jersey,  in  honor  of   Sir 
George  Carteret,  who  had  been  governor  of  the  island  of  Jersey 
in  the  English  Channel.     The  two  proprietors  divided  it  be 
tween  them  by  the  line  shown  on  the  map  (p.  56).     In  1674 
Berkeley  sold  West  Jersey  to  a  company  of  Quakers,  who 
settled  near  Burlington.     A  little  later,  1676,  William  Penn 
and  some  other  Quakers  bought  East  Jersey.    There  were  then 
two  colonies  till  1702,  when  the  proprietors  surrendered  their 
rights,  and  New  Jersey  became  one  royal  province. 

50.  The  Beginnings  of  Pennsylvania.  —  The  part  which  Penn 
took  in  the  settlement  of  New  Jersey  suggested  to  him  the 
idea  of  beginning  a  colony  which  should  be  a  refuge  for  the 
persecuted  of  all  lands  and  of  all  religions. 


56 


THE  ENGLISH  COLONIES 


Now  it  so  happened  that 
Penn  was  the  son  of  a 
distinguished  admiral  to 
whom  King  Charles  II. 
owed  £16,000,  and  seeing 
no  chance  of  its  ever  being 
paid,  he  proposed  to  the 
King,  in  1680,  that  the 
debt  be  paid  with  a  tract 
of  land  in  America.  The 
King  gladly  agreed,  and 
in  1681  Penn  received  a 
grant  west  of  the  Dela 
ware.  Against  Penn's 
wish,  the  King  called  it 
Pennsylvania,  or  Penn's 
Woodland.  It  was  given 
almost  precisely  the 
bounds  of  the  present 
state.1  In  1683  Penn 
made  a  famous  treaty  with  the  Indians,  and  laid  out  the  city 
of  Philadelphia. 

51.  The  Three  Lower  Counties:  Delaware.  —  If  you  look  at 
p.  124,  you  will  see  that  Pennsylvania  was  the  only  English 
colony  which  did  not  have  a  seacoast.  This  was  a  cause  of 
some  anxiety  to  Penn,  who  was  afraid  that  the  settlers  in  Dela 
ware  and  New  Jersey  might  try  to  prevent  his  colonists  from 
going  in  and  out  of  Delaware  Bay.  To  avoid  this,  he  bought 
what  is  now  Delaware  from  the  Duke  of  York. 

The  three  lower  counties  on  the  Delaware,  as  the  tract  was 

1  There  was  a  long  dispute,  however,  with  Lord  Baltimore,  over  the 
south  boundary  line,  which  was  not  settled  till  1763-67,  when  two  sur 
veyors,  Charles  Mason  and  Jeremiah  Dixon,  came  over  from  England 
and  located  it  as  at  present.  In  later  years,  when  all  the  Atlantic  sea 
board  states  north  of  Maryland  and  Delaware  had  abolished  slavery,  this 
"  Mason  and  Dixon's  Line  "  became  famous  as  the  dividing  line  between 
the  slave  and  the  free  Atlantic  states. 


THE    MIDDLE   AND   SOUTHERN   COLONIES 


57 


called,  had  no  boundary.  Lawfully  it  belonged  to  Lord  Balti 
more.  But  neither  the  Ihitch  patroons  who  settled  on  the 
Delaware  in  1631,  nor  the  Swedes  who  came  later,  nor  the 
Dutch  who  annexed  New  Sweden  to  ]  :herland,  nor 

the  English  who  conquered  the  Dutch,  paid  any  regard  to  Bal 
timore's  rights.  At  last,  after  the  purchase  of  Delaware,  the 
heirs  of  Baltimore  and  of  Penn  (1732;  agreed  on  what  is  the 
present  boundary  line.  After  1703  the  people  of  the  three 
lower  counties  were  allowed  to  have  an  assembly  or  legislature 
of  their  own ;  but  they  had  the  same  governor  as  Pennsylvania 
and  were  a  part  of  that  colony  till  the  Kevolution.1 

52.  Georgia.  —  The  return  of  the  Carolinas  to  the  King  in 
1729  was  very  soon  followed  by  the  establishment  of  the  last 
colony  ever  planted  by  England  in  the  United  States.  The 
founder  was  James  Oglethorpe,  an  English  soldier  and  mem 
ber  of  Parliament.  Filled  with  pity  for  the  poor  debtors  with 
whom  the  English  jails  were  then  crowded,  he  formed  a  plan 
to  pay  the  debts  of  the  most  deserving,  send  them  to  America, 
and  give  them  what  hundreds  of  thousands  of  men  have  since 
found  in  our  country,  —  a  chance  to  begin  life  anew. 

Great  numbers  of 
people  became  inter 
ested  in  his  plan,  and 
finally  twenty  -  two 
persons  under  Ogle- 
thorpe's  lead  formed 
an  association  and  se 
cured  a  charter  from 
King  George  II.  for 
a  colony,  which  they 
called  Georgia.  The 
territory  granted  lay 
between  the  Savan- 


NORTH     ,  C  A  R 


O   L   I    N_A 

"1 


SOUTH 


r  Pennsylvania  read  Janney's  Life  of  William  Penn  or  Dixon's 
History  of  William  Penn;  Proud's  or  Gordon's  Pennsylvania;  Lodge's 
Colonies,  pp.  213-226. 


58  THE   ENGLISH  COLONIES 

nah  and  the  Altatnaha  rivers,  and  extended  from  their  mouths 
to  their  sources  and  then  across  the  country  to  the  Pacific 
Ocean.  Oglethorpe  had  selected  this  tract  in  order  that  his  col 
onists  might  serve  the  patriotic  purpose  of  protecting  Charles 
ton  from  the  Spanish  attacks  to  which  it  was  then  exposed. 

Money  for  the  colony  was  easily  raised,1  and  in  November, 
1732,  Oglethorpe,  with  130  persons,  set  out  for  Charleston,  and 
after  a  short  stay  there  passed  southward  and  founded  the  city 
of  Savannah  (1733).  It  must  not  be  supposed  that  all  the  col 
onists  were  poor  debtors.  In  time,  Italians  from  Piedmont, 
Moravians  and  Lutherans  from  Germany,  and  Scotchmen  from 
the  Highlands,  all  made  settlements  in  Georgia. 

53.  The  Thirteen  English  Colonies.  —  Thus  it  came  about  that 
between  1606  and  1733  thirteen  English  colonies  were  planted 
on  the  Atlantic  seaboard  of  what  is  now  the  United  States. 
Naming  them  from  north  to  south,  they  were :  1.  New  Hamp 
shire,  with  no  definite  western  boundary ;  2.  Massachusetts, 
which  owned  Maine  and  a  strip  of  territory  across  the  conti 
nent  ;  3.  Rhode  Island,  with  her  present  bounds ;  4.  Connecti 
cut",  with  a  great  tract  of  land  extending  to  the  Pacific  ;  5.  New 
York,  with  undefined  bounds  ;  6.  New  Jersey  ;  7.  Pennsylvania 
and  8.  Delaware,  the  property  of  the  Penn  family ;  9.  Mary 
land,  the  property  of  the  heirs  of  Lord  Baltimore ;  10.  Virginia, 
with  claims  to  a  great  part  of  North  America;  11.  North  Caro 
lina,  12.  South  Carolina,  and  13.  Georgia,  all  with  claims  to 
the  Pacific. 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  English  seized  New  Netherland  (1664),  giving  it  to  the  Duke 

of  York ;  and  the  Duke,  after  establishing  the  province  of  New 
York,  gave  New  Jersey  to  two  of  his  friends,  and  sold  the  three 
counties  on  the  Delaware  to  William  Penn. 

2.  Meanwhile  the  King  granted  Penn  what  is  now  Pennsylvania  (1681). 

3.  The  Carol inas  were  first  chartered  as  one  proprietary  colony,  but  were 

sold  back  to  the  King  and  finally  separated  in  1729. 

4.  Georgia,  the  last  of  the  thirteen  English  colonies,  was  granted  to  Ogle 

thorpe  and  others  as  a  refuge  for  poor  debtors  (1732). 

1  The  House  of  Commons  gave  £10,000. 


THE   ENGLISH   COLONIES 


59 


English .  -, 


Failures  .  .  . 


1579.     Gilbert. 

1584. 

1587. 


|  Ralegh,  Roanoke  Island. 


Successes 


Dutch 


Swedes  .  . 


1613.  Begin  to 
colonize  New 
NetherlancL 

1638.  South  Com 
pany  makes  set 
tlement  on  the 
Delaware. 

1655.  Conquered 
by  the  Dutch. 


1606. 

1607. 
1609. 


1620. 

1622. 
1628. 

1629. 


1632. 
1639. 


1643. 


1643. 
1662. 

1663. 
1663. 


1664. 
1664. 
1681. 
1682. 
1691. 

1732. 


London  Company,  Plym 
outh  Company. 

Virginia  settled. 

Boundary  of  London  Com 
pany  changed.  Origin  of 
Virginia  claim. 

Landing  of  the  Pilgrims. 
Plymouth  colony. 

Grant  to  Mason  and  Gorges. 

Land  bought  for  Massachu 
setts  Bay  colony. 

Mason  and  Gorges  divide 
their  grant  into  Maine 
and  New  Hampshire. 

Maryland  patent  granted. 

Connecticut  f  Windsor, 
constitu-  -]  Hartford, 
tion.  I  Wethersfield. 

f  New  Haven. 
I  Milford. 
Guilford. 
Stamford. 

Rhode  Island  chartered. 

Connecticut  ( Connecticut, 
chartered.  I  New  Haven. 

Rhode  Island  rechartered. 

Carolina  f  After  1729  North 
patent  and  South  Car- 
granted,  t  olina. 

New  Netherland  conquered 
and  New  York  founded. 

New  Jersey  granted  to 
Berkeley  and  Carteret. 

Pennsylvania  granted  to 
Penn. 

Three  counties  on  the  Dela 
ware  bought  by  Penn. 

Plymouth  and  Maine  (and 
Nova  Scotia)  united  with 
Massachusetts. 

Georgia  chartered. 


New  Haven 
colony  or 
ganized. 


THE  FRENCH  AND    THE  INDIANS 

CHAPTER   VI 

THE   FRENCH   IN   THE   MISSISSIPPI  VALLEY 

54.  The  Early  French  Possessions  on  our  continent  may  be 
arranged  in  three  great  areas:  1.  Acadia,  2.  New  France, 
3.  Louisiana,  or  the  basin  of  the  Mississippi  River. 

ACADIA  comprised  what  is  now  New  Brunswick,  Nova  Scotia, 
and  a  part  of  Maine.  It  was  settled  in  the  early  years  of  the 
seventeenth  century  at  Port  Koyal  (now  Annapolis,  Nova 
Scotia),  at  Mount  Desert  Island,  and  on  the  St.  Croix  River. 

NEW  FRAXCE  was  the  drainage  basin  of  the  St.  Lawrence 
and  the  Great  Lakes.  As  far  back  as  1534  Jacques  Cartier 
explored  the  St.  Lawrence  River  to  the  site  of  Montreal.  But 
it  was  not  till  1608  that  a  party  under  Champlahi  made  the 
first  permanent  settlement  on  the  river,  at  Quebec. 

The  French  settlers  at  once  entered  into  an  alliance  with 
the  Huron  and  Algonquin  Indians,  who  lived  along  the  St. 
Lawrence  River.  But  these  tribes  were  the  bitter  enemies  of 
the  Iroquois,  who  dwelt  in  what  is  now  central  New  York, 
and  when,  in  consequence  of  this  alliance,  the  French  were 
summoned  to  take  the  warpath,  Champlain,  with  a  few  fol 
lowers,  went,  and  on  the  shore  of  the  lake  which  now  bears 
his  name,  not  far  from  the  site  of  Ticonderoga,  he  me^  and 
defeated  the  Iroquois  tribe  of  Mohawks  in  July,  1609. 

The  battle  was  a  small  affair;  but  its  consequences  were 
serious  and  lasting,  for  the  Iroquois  were  thenceforth  the 
enemies  of  the  French,  and  prevented  them  from  ever  coming 
southward  and  taking  possession  of  the  Hudson  and  the  Mo- 

60 


THE    FRENCH    IN   THE    MISSISSIPPI   VALLEY 


61 


hawk  valleys.  When,  therefore,  the  French  merchants  began 
to  engage  in  the  fur  trade  with  the  Indians,  and  the  French 
priests  began  their  efforts  to  convert  the  Indians  to  Christian 
ity,  they  were  forced  to  go  westward  further  and  further  into 
the  interior. 

Their  route,  instead  of  being  up  the  St.  Lawrence,  was  up 
the  Ottawa  River  to  its  head  waters,  over  the  portage  to  Lake 


ISO  140  130 


Nipissing,  and  down  its  outlet  to  Georgian  Bay,  where  the 
waters  of  the  Great  Lakes  lay  before  them  (see  map  on  p.  63). 
They  explored  these  lakes,  dotted  their  shores  here  and  there 
with  mission  and  fur-trading  stations,  and  took  possession  of 
the  country. 

55.    The  French  on  the  Mississippi.  —  In  the  course  of  these 
explorations  the  French  heard  accounts  from  the  Indians  of 


62  THE   FRENCH   AND   THE   INDIANS 

a  great  river  to  the  westward,  and  in  1672  Father  Marquette 
(mar-kef)  and  Louis  Joliet  (zho-le-a/)  were  sent  by  the  gov 
ernor  of  New  France  to  search  for  it.  They  set  out,  in  May, 
1673,  from  Michilimackinac,  a  French  trading  post  and  mis 
sion  at  the  foot  of  Lake  Michigan.  With  live  companions, 
in  two  birch-bark  canoes,  they  paddled  up  the  lake  to  Green 
Bay,  entered  Fox  River,  and,  dragging  the  boats  through 
its  boiling  rapids,  came  to  a  village  where  lived  the  Miainis 
and  the  Kickapoos.  These  Indians  tried  to  dissuade  them 
from  going  on;  but  Marquette  was  resolute,  and  on  the 
10th  of  June,  1673,  he  led  his  followers  over  the  swamps  and 
marshes  that  separated  Fox  River  from  a  river  which  the 
Indian  guides  assured  him  flowed  into  the  Mississippi.  This 
westward-flowing  river  he  called  the  Wisconsin,  and  there 
the  guides  left  him,  as  he  says,  "alone,  amid  that  unknown 
country,  in  the  hands  of  God." 

The  little  band  shoved  their  canoes  boldly  out  upon  the 
river,  and  for  seven  days  floated  slowly  downward  into  the 
unknown.  At  last,  on  the  17th  of  June,  they  paddled  out 
on  the  bosom  of  the  Mississippi,  and,  turning  their  canoes  to 
the  south,  followed  the  bends  and  twists  of  the  river,  past 
the  mouth  of  the  Missouri,  past  the  Ohio,  to  a  point  not  far 
from  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas.  There  the  voyage  ended, 
and  the  party  went  slowly  back  to  the  Lakes.1 

56.  La  Salle  finishes  the  Work  of  Marquette  and  Joliet.  —  The 
discovery  of  Marquette  and  Joliet  was  the  greatest  of  the  age. 
Yet  five  years  went  by  before  Robert  de  la  Salle  (lah  sahl')  set 
forth  with  authority  from  the  French  King  "  to  labor  at  the 
discovery  of  the  western  part  of  New  France,"  and  began  the 
attempt  to  follow  the  river  to  the  sea.  In  1678  La  Salle  and 
his  companions  left  Canada,  and  made  their  way  to  the  shore 
of  Lake  Erie,  where  during  the  winter  they  built  and  launched 
the  Griffin,  the  first  ship  that  ever  floated  on  those  waters.  In 
this  they  sailed  to  the  mouth  of  Green  Bay,  and  from  there 
pushed  on  to  the  Illinois  River,  to  an  Indian  camp  not  far 
1  Read.Parkman's  La  Salle  and  the  Discovery  of  the  Great  West. 


'    ,,St  Augustine 

"'~ 

FRENCH   CLAIMS, 


«3 


64  THE   FRENCH  AND   THE   INDIANS 

from  the  site  of  Peoria,  111.  Just  below  this  camp  La  Salle 
built  Fort  Crevecoeur  (crav'-ker,  a  word  meaning  heart-break, 
vexation). 

Leaving  the  party  there  in  charge  of  Henri  de  Tonty  to 
construct  another  ship,  he  with  five  companions  went  back  to 
Canada.  On  his  return  he  found  that  Fort  Crevecoeur  was  in 
ruins,  and  that  Tonty  and  the  few  men  who  had  been  faith 
ful  were  gone,  he  knew  not  where.  In  the  hope  of  meeting 
them  he  pushed  on  down  the  Illinois  to  the  Mississippi.  To 
go  on  would  have  been  easy,  but  he  turned  back  to  find  Tonty, 
and  passed  the  winter  on  the  St.  Joseph  River. 

From  there  in  November,  1681,  he  once  more  set  forth, 
crossed  the  lake  to  the  place  where  Chicago  now  is,  went  up  the 
Chicago  River  and  over  the  portage  to  the  Illinois,  and  early 
in  February  floated  out  on  the  Mississippi.  It  was,  on  that 
day,  a  surging  torrent  full  of  trees  and  floating  ice ;  but  the 
explorers  kept  on  their  way  and  came  at  last  to  the  shores  of 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  There  La  Salle  took  formal  possession  of 
all  the  regions  drained  by  the  Mississippi,  the  Ohio,  and  their 
tributaries,  claiming  them  in  the  name  of  France,  and  naming 
the  country  thus  claimed  "  Louisiana."  The  iron  will,  the 
splendid  courage,  of  La  Salle  had  triumphed  over  every  obsta 
cle  and  made  him  one  of  the  grandest  characters  in  history. 

But  his  work  was  far  from  ended.  The  valley  he  had 
explored,  the  territory  he  had  added  to  France,  must  be  occu 
pied,  and  to  occupy  it  two  things  were  necessary  :  1.  A  colony 
must  be  planted  at  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi,  to  control  its 
navigation  and  shut  out  the  Spaniards.  2.  A  strong  fort  must, 
be  built  on  the  Illinois,  to  overawe  the  Indians. 

In  order  to  overawe  the  Indians,  La  Salle  now  hurried  back 
to  the  Illinois  River,  where,  in  December,  1682,  near  the  present 
town  of  Ottawa,  on  the  summit  of  a  cliff  now  known  as 
"  Starved  Rock,"  he  built  a  stockade  which  he  called  Fort  St. 
Louis.  In  1684,  while  on  a  voyage  from  France  to  plant  a 
colony  on  the  Mississippi,  he  missed  the  mouth  and  brought 
up  on  the  coast  of  Texas ;  and,  landing  on  the  sands  of  Mata- 


THE   FRENCH   IN   THE   MISSISSIPPI   VALLEY  65 

gorda  Bay,  the  colonists  built  another  Fort  St.  Louis.  But 
death  rapidly  reduced  their  numbers,  and,  in  their  distress, 
they  parted.  Some  remained  at  the  fort  and  were  killed  by 
the  Indians.  Others,  led  by  La  Salle,  started  for  the  Illinois 
River  and  reached  it;  but  without  their  leader,  whom  they 
had  murdered  on  the  way. 

SUMMARY 

1.  After  the  settlement  of  Quebec  (1608)  the  French  began  to  explore 

the  regions  lying  to  the  west,  discovered  the  Great  Lakes,  and  heard 
of  a  great  river  —  the  Mississippi. 

2.  This  river  Marquette  and  Joliet  explored  from  the  mouth  of  the  Wis 

consin  to  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas  (1673). 

3.  Then  La  Salle  floated  down  the  Mississippi  from  the  Illinois  to  the 

Gulf  of  Mexico,  .took  formal  possession  of  the  valley  in  the  name 
of  his  King,  and  called  it  Louisiana  (1682). 


Starved  Rock 


CHAPTER   VII 


THE   INDIANS 

57.  When  Europeans 
first  set  foot  on  our  shores, 
they  found  the  country 
already  inhabited,  and, 
adopting  the  name  given 
to  the  men  of  the  New 
World  by  Columbus,  they 
called  these  people  "In 
dians."  They  were  not 
"Indians,"  or  natives  of 
Asia,  but  a  race  by  them 
selves,  which  ages  before 
the  time  of  Columbus  was 
spread  over  all  North  and 
South  America. 

Like  their  descendants 
in  the  West  to-day,  they 
had  red  or  copper-colored 
skins,  their  eyes  and  long 
straight  hair  were  jet 
black,  their  faces  beardless,  and  their  cheek  bones  high. 

58.  The  Villages.  —  East  of  the  Eocky  Mountains  the  In 
dians  lived  in  villages,  often  covering  several  acres  in  area, 
and  surrounded  by  stockades  of  two  and  even  three  rows  of 
posts.  The  stockade  was  pierced  with  loopholes,  and  provided 
with  platforms  on  which  were  piles  of  stones  for  the  defenders 
to  hurl  on  the  heads  of  their  enemies.  Sometimes  the  struc- 


A  typical  Indian 


THE   INDIANS 


67 


tures  which  formed  the  village  were  wigwams  —  rude  structures 
made  by  driving  poles  into  the  ground  in  a  circle,  drawing 
their  tops  near  together,  and  then  covering 
them  with  bark  or  skins.  Sometimes  the 
dwellings  had  rudely  framed  sides  and 
roofs  covered  with  layers  of  elm  bark. 
Usually  these  structures  were  fifteen 
or  twenty  feet  wide  by  100  feet  long. 
At  each  end  was  a  door.  Along  each 
side  were  ten  or  twelve  stalls,  in  each 
of  which  lived  a  family,  so  that  one 
house  held  twenty  or  more  fam 
ilies.  Down  the  middle  at 
regular  intervals  were  fire 
pits  where  the  food  was 
cooked,  the  smoke  escaping 
through  holes  in  the  roof.1 

59.  Clans  and  Tribes. —  All  == 
the  families  living  in  such  a  house 
traced  descent  from  a  common  female 
ancestor,  and  formed  a  clan.  Each 
clan  had  its  own  name,  —  usually  that  of  some  animal,  as  the 
Wolf,  the  Bear,  or  the  Turtle,  —  its  own  sachem  or  civil  magis 
trate,  and  its  own  war  chiefs,  and  owned  all  the  food  and  all 
the  property,  except  weapons  and  ornaments,  in  common.  A 
number  of  such  clans  made  a  tribe,  which  had  one  language 
and  was  governed  by  a  council  of  the  clan  sachems. 


Buffalo-skin  lodge 


Seneca  long  house 
1  Read  Parkman's  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  17,  18; 


68         THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 

60.  The  Three  Indian  Races.  —  With  slight  exceptions,  the 
tribes  living  east  of  the  Mississippi  are  divided,  by  those  who 
have  studied  their  languages,  into  three  great  groups : 

1.  The  Muskhogees,  who  lived  south  of  the  Tennessee  River 

and  comprised  the  Creek,  the  Seminole,  the  Choctaw,  and 
the  Chickasaw  tribes. 

2.  The  Iroquoian  group,  which  occupied  the  country  from  the 

Delaware  and  the  Hudson  to  and  beyond  the  St.  Lawrence 
and  Lakes  Ontario  and  Erie,  besides  isolated  tracts  in 
North  Carolina  and  Tennessee.  The  chief  tribes  were 
the  Iroquois  proper,  —  forming  a  confederacy  in  central 
New  York  known  as  the  Five  Nations  (Senecas,  Cayugas, 
Onondagas,  Oneidas,  and  Mohawks),  —  the  Hurons,  the 
Eries,  the  Cherokees,  and  the  Tuscaroras. 

3.  The  Algonquian  group,  which  occupied  the  rest  of  what  is 

now  the  United  States  east  of  the  Mississippi,  besides 
the  larger  part  of  Canada.  In  this  group  were  the  Mohe- 
gans,  Pequots,  and Narragansetts  of  New  Eng-  /^L7  land; 
the  Delawares  ;  the  Powhatans  of  Vir 
ginia ;  the  Shawnees  of  the 
Ohio*  valley,  and  many 
others  living  around  the 
Great  Lakes.  Moccasin 

61.  Weapons   and  Implements  and  Clothing.  —  All   of    these 
tribes   had  made  some   progress    towards    civilization.     They 

used  pottery  and  ornamental  pipes  of  clay.     They 
raised  beans   and  squashes,  pumpkins,  tobacco, 
and  maize,  or  Indian  corn,  which  they  ground 
to  meal  by  rubbing  between  two  stones.     For 
hunting  they  had  bows,  arrows  with  stone 
heads,  hatchets  of  flint,  and  spears.     In 
summer  they  went  almost  naked.     In 
winter  they  wore  clothing  made  from 
the  skins  of  fur-bearing  animals  and 
Flint  hatchet  ^SD    the  hides  of  buffalo  and  deer.     For 


THE   INDIANS 


69 


navigating  streams  and  rivers,  lakes  and  bays,  they  con 
structed  canoes  of   birch   bark   sewed   together   with 
thongs  of  deerskin  and  smeared  at  the  joints  with 
spruce-tree  gum. 

62.    Traits  of  Character Living  an  outdoor  life, 

and  depending  for  daily  food  not  so  much  on  the 

maize  they  raised  as  on  the  fish  they  caught  and 

the   animals  they  killed,  the   Indians  were 

most  expert  woodsmen.    They  were  swift 

of  foot,  quick-witted,  keen-sighted,  and 

most  patient  of  hunger,  fatigue,  and  cold. 

White  men  were  amazed  at  the  rapidity 

with    which    the   Indian    followed   the 

most  obscure  trail  over  the  most  difficult 

ground,    at    the    perfection    with 

which  he  imitated  the  bark  of  the 

wolf,  the  hoot  of  the  owl,  the  call 

of  the  moose,  and  at  the  catlike  Ornamental  pipe 

tread  with  which  he  walked  over  beds  of  autumn  leaves  to 

the  side  of  the  grazing  deer. 

Courage  and  fortitude  he  possessed  in  the  highest 
degree.     Yet  with  his  bravery  were  associated  all 
the  vices,  all  the       dark  and  crooked  ways,  which 
sort  of  the  cowardly  and  the 
He  was  treacherous,  revengeful, 
and  cruel  beyond  description.    Much 
as  he  loved  war  (and  war  was  his 
chief   occupation),  the  fair  and  open 
fight  had  no  charm  for  him.     To  his 
mind  it  was  madness  to  take  the  scalp 
of  an  enemy  at  the  risk  of  his  own, 
when  he  might  waylay  him  in  an  am 
bush  or  shoot  him  with  an  arrow  from 
behind  a  tree.    He  was  never  so  happy 
as   when,  at   the    dead   of    night,  he 
Quiver,  with  bows  and  arrows    roused  his  sleeping  victims  with  an 
McM.  HIST. —5 


70  THE  FRENCH  AND   THE   INDIANS 

unearthly  yell  and  massacred  them  by  the  light  of  their  burn 
ing  home. 

63.  The  French  and  the  Indians.  —  The  ways  in  which  French 
and  English  colonists  acted  towards  the  Indian  are  highly  char 
acteristic,  and  account  for  much  in  our  history. 

From  the  day  when  Champlain,  in  1609,  joined  his  Huron- 
Algonquin  neighbors  and  went  with  them  on  the  warpath 
against  the  Iroquois,  the  French  held  to  the  policy  of  making 
friends  with  the  Indians.  No  pains  were  spared  to  win  them 
to  the  cause  of  France.  They  were  nattered,  petted,  treated 
with  ceremonial  respect,  and  became  the  companions,  as  the 
women  often  became  the  wives,  of  the  Frenchmen.  Much  was 
expected  of  this  mingling  of  races.  It  was  supposed  that  the 
Indian  would  be  won  over  to  civilization  and  Christianity.  But 
the  Frenchmen  were  won  over  to  the  Indians,  and  adopted  In 
dian  ways  of  life.  They  lived  in  wigwams,  wore  Indian  dress, 
decorated  their  long  hair  with  eagle  feathers,  and  made  their 
faces  hideous  with  vermilion,  ocher,  and  soot. 

64.  Coureurs  de  Bois.  —  There  soon  grew  up  in  this  way  a 
class  of  half-civilized  vagrants,  who  ranged  the  woods  in  true 
Indian  style,  and  gained  a  living  by  guiding  the   canoes   of 
fur  traders  along  the  rivers  and  lakes  of  the  interior.     Stimu 
lated  by  the  profits  of  the  fur  trade,  these  men  pushed  their 
traffic   to   the   most   distant   tribes,    spreading   French   guns, 
French  hatchets,  beads,  cloth,  tobacco  and  brandy,  and  French 
influence  over  the  whole  Northwest.     Where  the  trader  and 
the  coureur  de  bois  went,  the  priest  and  the  soldier  followed, 
and  soon  mission  houses  and  forts  were  established  at  all  the 
chief  passes  and  places  suited  to  control  the  Indian  trade. 

65.  The  English  and  the  Indians.  —  How,  meantime,  did  the 
English  act  toward  the  Indians  ?     In  the  first  place,  nothing 
led  them  to  form  close  relationship  with  the  tribes.      The  fur 
trade  —  the  source  of  Canadian  prosperity  —  and  the  zeal  of 
priests  eager  for  the  conversion  of  the  heathen,  which  sent  the 
traders,  the  coureurs  de  bois,  and  the  priests  from  tribe  to  tribe 
and  from  the  Atlantic  halfway  to  the  Pacific,  did  not  appeal 


THE   INDIANS  71 

to  the  English  colonists.  Farming  and  commerce  were  the 
sources  of  their  wealth.  Their  priests  and  missionaries  were 
content  to  labor  with  the  Indians  near  at  hand. 

In  the  second  place,  the  policy  of  the  French  towards  the 
Indians,  while  founded  on  trade,  was  directed  by  one  central 
government.  The  policy  of  the  English  was  directed  by  each 
colony,  and  was  of  as  many  kinds  as  there  were  colonies.  No 
English  frontier  exhibited  such  a  mingling  of  white  men  and 
red  as  was  common  wherever  the  French  went.  Among  the 
English  there  were  fur  traders,  but  no  coureurs  de  bois.  Scorn 
on  the  one  side  and  hatred  on  the  other  generally  marked  the 
intercourse  between  the  English  and  the  Indians.  One  bright 
exception  must  indeed  be  made.  Penn  was  a  broad-minded 
lover  of  his  kind,  a  man  of  most  enlightened  views  on  gov 
ernment  and  human  rights ;  and  in  the  colony  planted  by  him 
there  was  made  a  serious  effort  to  treat  the  Indian  as  an  equal. 
But  the  day  came  when  men  not  of  his  faith  dealt  with  the 
Indians  in  true  English  fashion. 

Remembering  this  difference  of  treatment,  we  shall  the  better 
understand  how  it  happened  that  the  French  could  sprinkle 
the  West  with  little  posts  far  from  Quebec  and  surrounded 
by  the  fiercest  of  tribes,  while  the  English  could  only  with 
difficulty  defend  their  frontier.1 

66.  Early  Indian  Wars. — Again  and  again  this  frontier  was 
attacked.  In  1636  the  Pequots,  who  dwelt  along  the  Thames 
River  in  Connecticut,  made  war  on  the  settlers  in  the  Con 
necticut  River  valley  towns. ,  Men  were  waylaid  and  scalped, 
or  taken  prisoners  and  burned  at  the  stake.  Determined  to 
put  an  end  to  this,  ninety  men  from  the  Connecticut  towns, 
with  twenty  from  Massachusetts  and  some  Mohegan  Indians, 
in  1637  marched  against  the  marauders.  They  found  the 
Pequots  within  a  circular  stockade  near  the  present  town  of 
Stonington,  where  of  400  warriors  all  save  five  were  killed. 

1  A  fine  account  of  the  Indians,  and  the  French  and  English  ways  of 
treating  them,  is  given  in  Parkman's  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac,  Vol.  I., 
pp.  16-25,  41-45,  46-56,  64-80. 


72  THE  FRENCH  AND  THE   INDIANS 

67.  King  Philip's  War.  —  During  nearly  forty  years  not  a 
tribe  in  all  New  England  dared  rise  against  the  white  men. 
But  in  1675  trouble  began  again.     The  settlers  were  steadily 
crowding  the  Indians  off  their  lands.     No  lands  were  taken 
without  payment,  yet  the  sales  were  far  from  being  voluntary. 
A  new  generation  of  Indians,  too,  had  grown  up,  and,  heedless 
of  the  lesson  taught  their  fathers,  the  Narragansetts,  Nip- 
mucks,  and  Wampanoags,  led  by  King  Philip  and  Canonchet, 
rose  upon  the  English.     A  dreadful  war  followed.     When  it 
ended,  in  1678,  the  three  tribes  were  annihilated.     Hardly  any 
Indians  save  the  friendly  Mohawks  were  left  in  New  England. 
But  of  ninety  English  towns,  forty  had  been  the  scene  of  fire 
and  slaughter,  and  twelve  had  been  destroyed  utterly. 

68.  The  Iroquois.  —  Elsewhere  on  the  frontier  a  happier  rela 
tion  existed  with  the  Indians.     The  Iroquois  of  central  New 
York   were   the   fiercest    and    most   warlike   Indians   of    the 
Atlantic  coast.      But   the  fight  with  Champlain,  in  1609,  by 
turning  them   into  implacable   enemies   of   the   French,   had 
rendered  them  all   the  more  tolerant  of   the  Dutch  and  the 
English,  while  their  complete  conquest  and  subjugation  of  the 
Delawares,  or  Lenni  Lenape,  prepared  the  way  for  the  easy 
settlement  of  New  Jersey  and  Pennsylvania. 

69.  Penn  and  the  Lenni  Lenape.  —  These  Indians  were  Algon- 
quian,  and  lived  along  the  Delaware  River  and  its  tributaries. 
But  early  in  the  seventeenth  century  they  had  been  reduced 
to  vassalage  by  the  Five  Nations,  had  been  forbidden  to  carry 
arms,  and  had  been  forced  to  take  the  name  of  Women.1 

When  the  Dutch  and  Swedes  began  their  settlements  on  the 
South  River,  and  when  Penn,  in  1683,  made  a  treaty  with  the 
Delawares,  the  settlers  had  to  deal  with  peaceful  Indians.  No 
horrid  wars  mark  the  early  history  of  Pennsylvania. 

70.  The  Powhatans  in  Virginia.  —  Much  the  same   may  be 
said  of  the  Virginia  tribes.     They  were  far  from  friendly,  and 
had  they  been  as  fierce  and  warlike  as  the  northern  tribes, 
neither  the  skill  of  John  Smith,  nor  the  marriage  of  Poca- 

1  Read  Parkman's  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  30-32,  80-82.     , 


THE   INDIANS 


73 


Powhatan  Indians  at  work  * 

hontas   (the   daughter   of   Powhatan)    with   John   Kolfe,  nor 
fear  of  the  English  muskets,  would  have  saved  Jamestown. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  destruction  of  the  tribes  in  New 
England  and  the  feud  between  the  French  and  the  Iroquois 
saved  New  England.  For  the  time  had  now  come  for  the 
opening  of  the  long  struggle  between  the  French  and  the  Eng 
lish  for  the  ownership  of  the  continent. 


SUMMARY 

1.  The  inhabitants  of  the  New  World  at  the  time  of  its  discovery,  by 

mistake  called  Indians,  were  barbarians,  lived  in  rude,  frail  houses, 
and  used  weapons  and  implements  inferior  to  those  of  the  whites. 

2.  The  Indian  tribes  of  eastern  North  America  are  mostly  divided  into 

three  great  groups :  Muskhogean,  Iroquoian,  and  Algonquian. 

3.  In  general,  the  French  made  the  Indians  their  friends,  while  the  Eng 

lish  drove  them  westward  and  treated  them  as  an  inferior  race. 

1  From  a  model. 


LTISH  COLONIES 

AND 

OPEAN  POSSESSIONS 
1733 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEW  FRANCE  AND  LOUISIANA 

71.  Louisiana,  or  the  Mississippi  Basin.  — The  landing  of  La 
Salle  on  the  coast  of  Texas,  and  the  building  of  Fort  St.  Louis 
of  Texas,  gave  the  French  a  claim  to  the  coast  as  far  south 
ward  as  a  point   halfway  between  the  fort  and  the  nearest 
Spanish  settlement,  in  Mexico.     At  that  point  was  the  Rio 
Grande,  a  good  natural  boundary.     On  the  French  maps,  there 
fore,  Louisiana  extended  from  the  Eocky  Mountains  and  the 
Rio  Grande  on  the  west,  to  the  Alleghany  Mountains  on  the 
east,  and  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  on  the  south,  to  New  France 
on  the  north.     This  confined  the  English  colonies  to  a  narrow 
strip   between    the   Alleghany   Mountains   and   the   Atlantic 
Ocean.     As  the  colonies  were  growing  in  population,  and  as 
the  charters  of  Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  Virginia,  and  Caro 
lina  gave  them  great  stretches  of  territory  in  the  Mississippi 
valley,  it  was  inevitable  that,  sooner  or  later,  a  bitter  contest 
for  possession  of  the  country  should  take  place  between  the 
French  and  the  English  in  America. 

The  contest  began  in  1689,  and  ended  in  1763,  and  may  easily 
be  divided  into  two  periods :  1.  That  from  1689  to  1748,  when 
the  struggle  was  for  Acadia  and  New  France.  2.  That  from 
1754  to  1763,  when  the  struggle  was  not  only  for  New  France, 
but  for  Louisiana  also. 

72.  The  Struggle  for    Acadia  and  New  France;    "King  Wil 
liam's  War."— In  1688-89  there  was  a  revolution  in  England, 
in  the  course  of  which  James  II.  was  driven  from  his  throne, 
and  William  and  Mary,  his  nephew  and  daughter,  were  seated 
on  it.     James  took  refuge  in  France,  and  when  Louis  XIV. 

76 


NEW   FRANCE   AND   LOUISIANA  77 

attempted  to  restore  him,  a  great  European  war  followed,  and 
of  course  the  colonists  of  the  two  countries  were  very  soon 
fighting  each  other.  As  the  quarrel  did  not  arise  on  this  side 
of  the  ocean,  the  English  colonists  called  it  "  King  William's 
War";  but  on  our  continent  it  was  really  the  beginning  of  a 
long  struggle  to  determine  whether  France  or  England  should 
rule  North  America. 

The  French  recognized  this  at  once,  and  sent  over  a  very 
able  soldier  —  Count  Frontenac  —  with  orders  to  conquer  New 
York;  but  the  colony  was  saved  by  the  Iroquois,  who  in  the 
summer  of  1689  began  a  war  of  their  own  against  the  French, 
laid  siege  to  Montreal,  and  roasted  French  captives  under  its 
walls.  Frontenac  was  compelled  to  put  off  his  attack  till  1690, 
when  in  the  dead  of  winter  a  band  of  French  and  Indians 
burned  Schenectady,  N.Y.  Salmon  Falls  in  New  Hampshire 
was  next  laid  waste  (1690),  and  Fort  Loyal,  where  Portland, 
Me.,  is,  was  taken  and  destroyed.  A  little  later  Exeter, 
N.H.,  was  attacked.  The  boldness  and  suddenness  of  these 
fearful  massacres  so  alarmed  the  people  exposed  to  them  that 
in  May,  1690,  delegates  from  Massachusetts,  Plymouth,  Con 
necticut,  and  New  York  met  at  New  York  city  to  devise  a 
plan  of  attack  on  the  French.  Now,  at  the  opening  of  the 
war,  there  were  three  French  strongholds  in  America.  These 
were  Montreal  and  Quebec  in  Canada,  and  Port  Eoyal  in 
Acadia.  In  1690  a  Massachusetts  fleet  led  by  Sir  William 
Phips  destroyed  Port  Royal.  It  was  decided,  therefore,  to 
send  another  fleet  under  Phips  to  take  Quebec,  while  troops 
from  New  York  and  Connecticut  marched  against  Montreal. 
Both  expeditions  were  failures,  and  for  seven  years  the  French 
and  Indians  ravaged  the  frontier.  In  1692  York,  in  Maine, 
was  visited  and  a  third  of  the  inhabitants  killed.  In  1694 
Castine  was  taken  and  a  hundred  persons  scalped  and  toma 
hawked.  At  Durham,  in  New  Hampshire,  prisoners  were 
burned  alive.  Groton,  in  Massachusetts,  was  next  visited ; 
but  the  boldest  of  all  was  the  massacre,  in  1697,  at  Haverhill, 
a  town  not  thirty-five  miles  from  Boston.  In  1696,  Frontenac, 


78 


THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 


at  the  head  of  a  great  array  of  Canadians,  coureurs  de  bois,  and 
Indians,  invaded  the  country  of  the  Onondagas,  and  leveled 
their  fortified  town  to  the  earth. 

73.  The  Struggle  for  Acadia  and  New  France;  "Queen  Anne's 
War."  —  In  1697  the  war  ended  with  the  treaty  of  Ryswick, 
and  "King  William's  War"  came  to  a  close  in  America  with 
nothing  gained  and  much  lost  on  each  side.  The  peace,  how- 


G  ULF      OF       ST.    LAWRENCE 


OYALE 


MAP  OF  PART  OF 

ACADIA 


"C.  Sable 


ever,  did  not  last  long,  for  in  1701  England  and  France  were 
again  fighting.  As  William  died  in  1702,  and  was  succeeded 
by  his  sister-in-law  Anne,  the  struggle  which  followed  in  Amer 
ica  was  called  "  Queen  Anne's  War."  Again  Port  Eoyal  was 
captured  (1710)  ;  again  an  expedition  went  against  Quebec  and 
failed  (1711)  ;  and  again,  year  after  year,  the  French  and  In 
dians  swept  along  the  frontier  of  New  England,  burning  towns 
and  slaughtering  and  torturing  the  inhabitants.  At  last  the 
treaty  of  Utrecht,  in  1713,  ended  the  strife,  and  the  first  signs 


NEW  FRANCE   AND  LOUISIANA  79 

of  English  conquest  in  America  were  visible,  for  the  French 
gave  up  Acadia  and  acknowledged  the  claims  of  the  English 
to  Newfoundland  and  the  country  around  Hudson  Bay.  The 
name  Acadia  was  changed  by  the  conquerors  to  Nova  Scotia. 
Port  Koyal,  never  again  to  be  parted  with,  they  called  Annap 
olis,  in  honor  of  the  Queen.1 

74.  The  French  take  Possession  of  the  Mississippi  Valley ; 
the  Chain  of  Forts.  —  The  peace  made  at  Utrecht  was  unbroken 
for  .thirty  years.  But  this  long  period  was,  on  the  part  of  the 
French  in  America,  at  least,  a  time  of  careful  preparation  for 
the  coming  struggle  for  possession  of  the  valleys  of  the  Missis 
sippi,  the  Ohio,  and  the  Lakes.  In  the  Mississippi  valley  most 
elaborate  preparations  for  defense  were  already  under  way. 
No  sooner  did  the  treaty  of  Kyswick  end  the  first  French  war 
than  a  young  naval  officer  named  Iberville  applied  to  the  King 
for  leave  to  take  out  an  expedition  and  found  a  colony  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Mississippi,  just  as  La  Salle  had  attempted  to  do. 
Permission  was  readily  given,  and  in  1698  Iberville  sailed  with 
two  ships  from  France,  and  in  February,  1699,  entered  Mobile 
Bay.  Leaving  his  fleet  at  anchor,  he  set  off  with  a  party  in 
small  boats  in  search  of  the  great  river.  He  coasted  along  the 
shore,  entered  the  Mississippi  through  one  of  its  three  mouths, 
and  went  up  the  river  till  he  came  to  an  Indian  village,  where 
the  chief  gave  him  a  letter  which  Tonty,  thirteen  years  before, 
when  in  search  of  La  Salle,  had  written  and  left  in  the  crotch 
of  a  tree. 

Iberville  now  knew  that  he  was  on  the  Mississippi ;  but  hav 
ing  seen  no  spot  along  its  low  banks  suitable  for  the  site  of  a 
city,  he  went  back  and  led  his  colony  to  Biloxi  Bay,  and  there 
settled  it.  Thus  when  the  eighteenth  century  opened  there 
were  in  all  Louisiana  but  two  French  settlements  —  that 
founded  on  the  Illinois  River  by  La  Salle,  and  that  begun  by 
Iberville  at  Biloxi.  But  the  occupation  of  Louisiana  was  now 
the  established  policy  of  France,  and  hardly  a  year  went  by 
without  one  or  more  forts  appearing  somewhere  in  the  valley. 
1  Read  Parkman's  A  Half-century  of  Conflict,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  1-149. 


80  THE   FRENCH  AND  THE   INDIANS 

Before  1725  came,  Mobile  Bay  was  occupied,  New  Orleans  was 
founded,  and  Forts  Rosalie,  Toulouse,  Tombeckbee,  Natchi- 
toches,  Assumption,  and  Chartres  were  erected.  Along  the 
Lakes,  Detroit  had  been  founded,  Niagara  was  built  in  1726, 
and  in  1731  a  band  of  Frenchmen,  entering  New  York,  put  up 
Crown  Point.1 

The  meaning  of  this  chain  of  forts  stretching  from  New 
Orleans  and  Mobile  to  Lake  Champlain  and  Montreal,  was 
that  the  French  were  determined  to  shut  the  English  out  of 
the  valley  of  the  Mississippi,  and  to  keep  them  away  from  the 
shores  of  the  Great  Lakes.  But  they  were  also  determined  at 
the  first  chance  to  reconquer  Annapolis  and  Nova  Scotia,  which 
they  had  lost  by  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  in  1713.  As  a  very 
important  step  towards  the  accomplishment  of  this  purpose, 
the  French  selected  a  harbor  on  the  southeast  coast  of  Cape 
Breton  Island,  and  there  built  Louisburg,  a  fortress  so  strong 
that  the  French  officers  boasted  that  it  could  be  defended  by  a 
garrison  of  women. 

75.  The  Struggle  for  New  France;  "King  George's  War." — 
Such  was  the  situation  in  America  when  (in  March,  1744)  France 
declared  war  on  England  and  began  what  in  Europe  was  called 
the  "  War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  " ;  but  in  our  country  it 
was  known  as  "King  George's  War,"  because  George  II.  was 
then  King  of  England.  The  French,  with  their  usual  prompt 
ness,  rushed  down  and  .burned  the  little  English  post  of  Canso, 
in  Nova  Scotia,  carried  off  the  garrison,  and  attacked  Annap 
olis,  where  they  were  driven  off.  That  Nova  Scotia  could  be 
saved,  seemed  hopeless.  Nevertheless,  Governor  Shirley  of 
Massachusetts  determined  to  make  the  attempt,  and  that  the 
King  might  know  the  exact  situation  he  sent  to  London,  with 
a  dispatch,  an  officer  named  Captain  Eyal,  who  had  been  taken 
prisoner  at  Canso  and  afterwards  released  on  parole.2 

1  Parkman's  A  Half-century  of  Conflict,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  288-314.    For  the 
French  posts  see  map  on  pp.  74,  75. 

2  The  reception  of  that  officer  well  illustrates  the  gross  ignorance  of 
America  and  American  affairs  which  then  existed  in  England.    When  the 


NEW  FRANCE  AND  LOUISIANA  81 

Although  Shirley  applied  to  the  King  for  help  with  which  to 
defend  Nova  Scotia,  he  knew  full  well  that  the  burden  of  de 
fense  would  fall  on  the  colonies.  And  with  that  determination 
and  persistence  which  always  brings  success  he  labored  hard 
to  persuade  New  Hampshire,  Connecticut,  and  Rhode  Island  to 
join  with  Massachusetts  in  an  effort  to  capture  Louisburg.  It 
would  be  delightful  to  tell  how  he  overcame  all  difficulties; 
how  the  young  men  rallied  on  the  call  for  troops ;  how  at 
the  end  of  March,  1745,  4000  of  them  in  a  hundred  trans 
ports  and  accompanied  by  fourteen  armed  ships  set  sail,  fol 
lowed  by  the  prayers  of  all  New  England,  and  after  a  siege  of 
six  weeks  took  the  fortress  on  the  17th  of  June,  1745.  But  the 
story  is  too  long.1  It  is  enough  to  know  that  the  victory  was 
hailed  with  delight  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  but  that  when 
peace  came,  in  1748,  the  British  government  was  still  so  blind 
to  the  struggle  for  North  America  which  had  been  going  on  for 
fifty  years,  that  Louisburg  was  restored  to  the  French. 

76.  The  French  on  the  Allegheny  River;  the  Buried  Plates. 
—  With  Louisburg  back  in  their  possession  and  no  territory 
lost,  the  French  went  on  more  vigorously  than  ever  with  their 
preparations  to  shut  the  British  out  of  the  Mississippi  val 
ley  ;  and  as  but  one  highway  to  the  valley,  the  Ohio  Eiver, 
was  still  unguarded,  the  governor  of  Canada,  in  1749,  dis 
patched  Celoron  de  Bienville  with  a  band  of  men  in  twenty- 
three  birch-bark  canoes  to  take  formal  possession  of  the  valley. 
Paddling  up  the  St.  Lawrence  and  Lake  Ontario,  they  carried 
their  canoes  across  to  Lake  Erie,  and,  skirting  the  southeastern 
shore,  they  landed  and  crossed  to  Chautauqua  Lake,  down  which 
and  its  outlet  they  floated  to  the  Allegheny  Kiver.  Once  on 

Duke  of  Newcastle,  who  was  prime  minister,  read  the  dispatch,  he  ex 
claimed :  "Oh,  yes  —  yes  —  to  be  sure.  Annapolis  must  be  defended 

troops  must  be  sent  to  Annapolis.  Pray  where  is  Annapolis?  Cape 
Breton  an  island  !  Wonderful !  Show  it  me  on  the  map.  So  it  is,  sure 
enough.  My  dear  sir  [to  Captain  Kyal],  you  always  bring  us  good  news. 
I  must  go  and  tell  the  King  that  Cape  Breton  is  an  island." 

1  Read  Samuel  Adams  Drake's  Taking  of  Louisburg  ;  Parkman's-  A 
Half-century  of  Conflict,  Vol.  II. ,  pp.  78-161. 


82 


THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 


the  Allegheny,  the  ceremony  of  taking  possession  began.  The 
men  were  drawn  up,  and  Louis  XV.  was  proclaimed  king  of  all 
the  region  drained  by  the  Ohio.  The  arms  of  France  stamped 
on  a  sheet  of  tin  were  nailed  to  a  tree,  at  the  foot  of  which  a 
lead  plate  was  buried  in  the  ground.  On  the  plate  was  an  in 
scription  claiming  the  Ohio,  and  all  the  streams  that  run  into 

TRANSLATION   OF   THE   EN 
TIRE    INSCRIPTION 


In  the  year  1749,  during  the  reign 
of  Louis  XV.,  King  of  France,  we, 
Celeron,  commander  of  a  detachment 
sent  by  the  Marquis  de  la  Gallisso- 
niere,  commander  in  chief  of  New 
France,  to  restore  tranquillity  in  some 
savage  villages  of  these  districts,  have 
buried  this  plate  at  the  confluence  of 
the  Ohio  and  .  .  .  this..  .  .  near 
the  river  Ohio,  alias  Beautiful  River, 
as  a  monument  of  our  having  re 
taken  possession  of  the  said  river 
Ohio  and  of  those  that  fall  into  the 
same,  and  of  all  the  lands  on  both 
sides  as  far  as  the  sources  of  the 
said  rivers,  as  well  as  of  those  of 
which  preceding  kings  have  enjoyed 
possession,  partly  by  the  force  of 
arms,  partly  by  treaties,  especially 
by  those  of  Ryswick,  Utrecht,  and 
Aix-la-Chapelle. 


1  Half  of  one  of  the  lead  plates 


it,  in  the  name  of  the  King  of  France.  A  second  plate  was 
buried  below  the  mouth  of  French  Creek;  a  third  near  the 
mouth  of  Wheeling  Creek ;  and  a  fourth  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Muskingum,  where  half  a  century  later  it  was  found  protrud 
ing  from  the  river  bank  by  a  party  of  boys  while  bathing. 
Yet  another  was  unearthed  at  the  mouth  of  the  Great  Kanawha 
by  a  freshet,  and  was  likewise  found  by  a  boy  while  playing 

1  Now  owned  by  the  American  Antiquarian  Society,  Worcester,  Mass. 


NEW  FRANCE   AND  LOUISIANA  88 

at  the  water's  edge.  The  last  plate  was  hidden  where  the 
Great  Miami  joins  the  Ohio ;  and  this  done,  Celoron  crossed 
Ohio  to  Lake  Erie  and  went  back  to  Montreal.1 

77.  The  French  build  Forts  on  the  Allegheny.  —  This  formal 
taking  possession  of  the  valleys  of  the  Allegheny  and  the  Ohio 
was  all  well  enough  in  its  way ;  but  the  French  knew  that  if 
they  really  intended  to  keep  out  the  British  they  must  depend 
on  forts  and  troops,  and  not  on  lead  plates.     To  convince  the 
French  King  of  this,  required  time ;  so  that  it  was  not  till  1752 
that  orders  were  given  to  fortify  the  route  taken  by  Celoron 
in  1749.     The  party  charged  with  this  duty  repaired  to  the 
little  peninsula  where  is  now  the  city  of  Erie,  and  there  built 
a  log  fort  which  they  called  Presque  Isle.     Having  done  this, 
they  cut  a  road  twenty  miles  long,  to  the  site  of  Waterford, 
Pa.,  and  built  Fort  Le  Boeuf,  and  later  one  at  Venango,  the 
present  site  of  the  town  of  Franklin. 

78.  Washington's  First  Public  Service.  —  The  arrival  of  the 
French  in  western  Pennsylvania  alarmed  and  excited  no  one 
so  much  as  Governor  Robert  Dinwiddie  of  Virginia.     He  had 
two  good  reasons  for  his  excitement.     In  the  first  place,  Vir 
ginia,  because  of  the  interpretation  she  placed  on  her  charter 
of  1609,  claimed   to   own   the   Allegheny  valley  (see  p.  33). 
In  the  second  place,  the  governor  and  a  number  of  Virginia 
planters    were   deeply   interested   in   a  great   land    company 
called  the  Ohio  Company,  to  which  the  King  of  England  had 
given  500,000  acres  lying  along  the  Ohio  River  between  the 
Monongahela  and  the   Kanawha  rivers,  a  region  which  the 
French  claimed,  and  toward  which  they  were  moving. 

As  soon,  therefore,  as  Dinwiddie  heard  that  the  French  were 
really  building  forts  in  the  upper  Allegheny  valley,  he  deter 
mined  to  make  a  formal  demand  for  their  withdrawal,  and 
chose  as  his  messenger  George  Washington,  then  a  young  man 
of  twenty-one,  and  adjutant  general  of  the  Virginia  militia. 

1  Read  T.  J.  Chapman's  Tlie  French  in  the  Allegheny  Valley,  pp.  9-23, 
187-197  ;  Parkman's  Montcalm  and  Wolfe,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  36-62;  Winsor's 
The  Mississippi  Basin,  pp.  252-255. 


84 


THE   FRENCH  AND   THE   INDIANS 


Washington's  instructions  bade  him 
go  to  Logstown,  on  the  Ohio,  find  out 
all  he  could  as  to  the  whereabouts  of 
the  French,  and  then  proceed  to  the 
commanding  officer,  deliver  the  letter 
of  Dinwiddie,  and  demand  an  answer. 
He  was  especially  charged  to  ascer 
tain  how  many  French  forts  had  been 
erected,  how  many  soldiers  there  were 
in  each,  how  far  apart  the  posts  were, 
and  if  they  were  to  be  supported  from 
Quebec.1 

With  that  promptness  which  dis 
tinguished  him  during  his  whole  life, 
Washington  set  out  on  his   perilous 
journey  the  very  day  he  received  his 
instructions,  and  made  his  way  first 
to  Logstown,  and  then   to   Fort  Le 
Bceuf,  where  he  delivered  Governor 
Dinwiddie's    letter    to 
the  French  command 
ant.  The  reply  of  Saint- 
Pierre —  for   that  was 
the  name  of  the  French 
commandant  —  was 
that  he  would  send  the 
letter  of  Dinwiddie  to 
the  governor  of  Canada, 
the  Marquis  Duquesne 
(doo-kan'),  and  that,  in  the  meantime,  he  would  hold  the  fort. 

79.  Fort  Duquesne.  —  When  Dinwiddie  read  the  answer  of 
Saint-Pierre,  he  saw  clearly  that  the  time  had  come  to  act. 
The  French  were  in  force  on  the  upper  Allegheny,  Unless 

1  Bead  T.  J.  Chapman's  The  French  in  the  Allegheny  Valley,  pp.  23- 
47;  Parkman's  Montcalm  and  Wolfe,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  128-161;  Lodge's 
George  Washington,  pp.  52-69. 


m 


I 


MffelP 


The  French  and  the  English  forts 


NEW  FRANCE   AND  LOUISIANA 


85 


something  was  done  to  drive  them  out,  they  would  soon  be  at 
;he  forks  of  the  Ohio,  and  once  they  were  there,  the  splendid 
;ract  of  the  Ohio  Company  would  be  lost  forever.  Without 
i  moment's  delay  he  decided  to  take  possession  of  the  forks 
>f  the  Ohio,  and  raised  two  companies  of  militia  of  100  men 
>ach.  A  trader  named  William  Trent  was  in  command  of  one 
)f  the  companies,  and  that  no  time  should  be  lost,  he,  with 
x>rty  men,  hurried  forward,  and,  February  17,  1754,  drove  the 
irst  stake  of  a  stockade  that  was  to  surround  a  fort  on  the 
dte  of  the  city  of  Pittsburg.  While  the  English  were  still 
it  work  on  their  fort,  April  17,  1754,  a  body  of  French  and 
[ndians  came  down  from  Le  Boeuf,  and  bade  them  leave  the 
/•alley.  Trent  was  away,  and  the  working  party  was  in  com- 
nand  of  an  ensign  named  Ward,  who,  as  resistance  was  use- 
.ess,  surrendered,  and  was  allowed  to  march  off  with  his  men. 
rhe  French  then  finished  the  fort  Trent  had  begun,  and  called 
it  Fort  Duquesne,  after  the  governor  of  Canada. 

80.  "Join  or  Die."  —  Meantime  the  legislature  of  Virginia 
roted  £10,000  for  the  defense  of  the  Ohio  valley,  and  promised 
i  land  bounty  to  every  man  who 
would  volunteer  to  fight  the  French 
md  Indians.  Joshua  Frye  was 
nade  colonel,  and  Washington  lieu 
tenant  colonel  of  the  troops  thus 
bo  be  raised.  As  some  time  must 
elapse  before  the  ranks  could  be 
filled,  Washington  took  seventy- 
five  men  and  (in  March,  1754)  set  off  to  help  Trent ;  but  he  had 
lot  gone  far  on  his  way  when  Ensign  Ward  met  him  (where 
Cumberland,  Md.,  now  is)  and  told  him  all  about  the  surrender. 
Accounts  of  the  affair  were  at  once  sent  to  the  governors  of 
Maryland,  Pennsylvania,  and  Virginia.  In  publishing  one  of 
:hese  in  the  Pennsylvania  Gazette,  Franklin  inserted  the  above 
picture  at  the  top  of  the  account.1 

1  There  is  an  old  superstition,  then  very  generally  believed,  that  if  one 
nits  a  snake  in  pieces  and  allows  the  pieces  to  touch,  the  snake  will  not 


86  THE   FRENCH   AND   THE    INDIANS 

81.  Albany  Plan  of   Union.  —  The  picture  was  apt   for   the 
following  reason.    The  Lords  of  Trade  in  London  l  had  ordered 
the  colonies  to  send  delegates  to  Albany  to  make  a  treaty  with 
the  Iroquois  Indians,  and  to  this  congress  Franklin  purposed 
to  submit  a  plan   for   union   against  the  French.     The  plan 
drawn  up  by  the  congress  was  not  approved  by  the  colonies, 
so  the  scheme  of  union  came  to  naught. 

82.  Washington's  Expedition.  —  Meanwhile  great  events  were 
happening  in  the  west.     When  Washington  met  Ensign  Ward 
at  Cumberland  and  heard  the  story  of  the  surrender,  he  was  at 
a  loss  just  what  to  do ;  but  knowing  that  he  was  expected  to  do 
something,  he  decided  to  go  to  a  storehouse  which  the  Ohio 
Company  had  built  at  the  mouth  of  a  stream  called  Redstone 
Creek  in  southwestern  Pennsylvania.     Pushing  along,  cutting 
as  he  went  the  first  road  that  ever  led  down  to  the  valley  of 
the  Mississippi  from  the  Atlantic  slope,  he  reached  a  narrow 
glade  called  the  Great   Meadows  and  there  began  to  put  up 
a  breastwork  which  he  named  Fort  Necessity.     While  so  en 
gaged  news  came  that  the   French  were   near.     Washington 
thereupon   took   a   few   men,  and,  coming   suddenly   on  the 
French,  killed  or  captured  them  all    save   one.     Among  the 
dead  was  Jumonville,  the  leader  of  the  party.     Well  satisfied 
with  this  exploit,  Washington  pushed  on  with  his  entire  force 
towards  the  Ohio.      But,  hearing   that   the   French  were  ad 
vancing,  he  fell  back  to  Fort   Necessity,  and  there   awaited 
them.     He  did  not  wait  long;   for  the   French  and  Indians 
came  down  in  great  force,  and  on  July  4,  1754,  forced  him, 
after  a  brave   resistance,  to  surrender.      He  was  allowed  to 
march  out  with  drums  beating  and  flags  flying.2 

83.  The  French  and  Indian  War.  —  Thus  was  begun  what  the 
colonists  called  the  French  and  Indian  War,  but  what  was 

die,  but  will  live  and  become  whole  again.  By  this  picture  Franklin 
meant  that  unless  the  colonies  joined  for  defense  against  the  French  they 
would  die  ;  that  is,  be  conquered. 

1  See  p.  107.  2  Lodge's  George  Washington,  pp.  69-74  ;  Winsor's 

The  Mississippi  Basin,  pp.  294-315. 


NEW   FRANCE   AND  LOUISIANA  87 

really  a  struggle  between  the  French  and  the  British  for  the 
possession  of  America.  Knowing  it  to  be  such,  both  sides 
made  great  preparations  for  the  contest.  The  French  stood  on 
the  defensive.  The  British  made  the  attack,  and  early  in  1755 
sent  over  one  of  their  ablest  officers,  Major  General  Edward 
Braddock,  to  be  commander  in  chief  in  America.  He  sum 
moned  the  colonial  governors  to  meet  him  at  Alexandria,  Va., 
where  a  plan  for  a  campaign  was  agreed  on. 

84.  Plan  for  the  War.  —  Vast  stretches  of  dense  and  almost 
impenetrable  forest  then  separated  the   colonies   of   the  two 
nations,  but  through  this  forest  were  three  natural  highways 
of  communication:     1.    Lake   George,  Lake   Champlain,  and 
the  St.  Lawrence  River.     2.    The  Hudson,  the  Mohawk,  Lake 
Ontario,  and  the  Niagara  Kiver.      3.    The  Potomac  to  Fort 
Cumberland,  and  through  the  forest  to  Fort  Duquesne.1 

It  was  decided,  therefore,  to  have  four  expeditions. 

1.  One  was  to  go  north  from  New  York  to  Lake  Champlain, 

take  Forts  Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point,  and  move 
against  Quebec. 

2.  Another  was  to  sail  from  New  England  and  make  such  a 

demonstration  against  the  French  towns  to  the  north 
east,  as  would,  prevent  the  French  in  that  quarter  going 
off  to  defend  Quebec  and  Crown  Point. 

3.  The  third  was  to  start  from  Albany,  go  up  the  Mohawk, 

and  down  the  Oswego  Kiver  to  Lake  Ontario,  and  along 
its  shores  to  the  Niagara  Kiver. 

4.  The  fourth  was  to  go  from  Fort  Cumberland  across  Penn 

sylvania  to  Fort  Duquesne. 

85.  Braddock's  Defeat,  July  9,  1755.  —  Braddock  took  com 
mand  of  this  last  expedition  and  made  Washington  one  of  his 
aids.    For  a  while  he  found  it  impossible  to  move  his  army,  for 
in  Virginia  horses  and  wagons  were  very  scarce,  and  without 
them  he  could  not  carry  his  baggage  or  drag  his  cannon.     At 
last  Benjamin  Franklin,  then  deputy  postmaster-general  of  the 

1  See  maps  on  pp.  75,  84,  133. 


88         THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 

colonies,  persuaded  the  farmers  of  Pennsylvania,  who  had 
plenty,  to  rent  the  wagons  and  horses  to  the  general. 

All  this  took  time,  so  that  it  was  June  before  the  army  left 
Fort  Cumberland  and  literally  began  to  cut  its  way  through 
the  woods  to  Fort  Duquesne.1  The  inarch  was  slow,  but  all 
went  well  till  the  troops  had  crossed  the  Monongahela  River 
and  were  but  eight  miles  from  the  fort,  when  suddenly  the 
advance  guard  came  face  to  face  with  an  army  of  Indians  and 
French.  The  Indians  and  French  instantly  hid  in  the  bushes 
and  behind  trees,  and  poured  an  incessant  fire  into  the  ranks 
of  the  British.  They,  too,  would  gladly  have  fought  in  Indian 
fashion.  But  Braddock  thought  this  cowardly  and  would  not 
allow  them  to  get  behind  trees,  so  they  stood  huddled  in 
groups,  a  fine  mark  for  the  Indians,  till  so  many  were  killed 
that  a  retreat  had  to  be  ordered.  Then  they  fled,  and  had  it 
not  been  for  Washington  and  his  Virginians,  who  covered  their 
flight,  they  would  probably  have  been  killed  to  a  man.2 

Braddock  was  wounded  just  as  the  retreat  began,  and  died  a 
few  days  later. 

86.  The  Other  Expeditions.  —  The  expedition  against  Niagara 
was  a  failure.     The  officer  in  command  did  not  take  his  army 
further  than  Oswego  on  Lake  Ontario. 

The  expedition  against  Crown  Point  was  partially  success 
ful,  and  a  stubborn  battle  was  fought  and  a  victory  won  over 
the  French  on  the  shores  of  that  beautiful  sheet  of  water  which 
the  English  ever  after  called  Lake  George  in  honor  of  the  King. 

87.  War  declared.  —  Up  to  this  time  all  the  fighting  had  been 
done  along  the  frontier  in  America.     But  in  May,  1756,  Great 
Britain  formally  declared  war  against  France.     The  French  at 
once  sent  over  Montcalm,3  the  very  ablest  Frenchman  that  ever  • 
commanded  on  this  continent,  and  there  followed  two  years  of 

1  The  line  of  march  is  shown  on  the  map,  p.  84. 

2  Read  Parkman's  Montcalm  and  Wolfe,  Vol.  I.,  Chap.  7,  pp.  162- 
187  ;  T.  J.  Chapman's  The  French  in  the  Allegheny  Valley,  pp.  60-72  ; 
Sargeant's  History  of  Braddock' s  Expedition. 

8  Read  Parkman's  Montcalm  and  Wolfe,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  318-380. 


NEW   FRANCE   AND   LOUISIANA  89 

warfare  disastrous  to  the  British.  Montcalm  took  and  burned 
Oswego,  won  over  the  Indians  to  the  cause  of  France,  and 
was  about  to  send  a  strong  fleet  to  attack  New  England, 
when,  toward  the  end  of  1757,  William  Pitt  was  made  virtu- 
lily  (though  not  in  name)  Prime  Minister  of  England. 

William  Pitt  was  one  of  the  greatest  Englishmen  that  ever 
iived.  He  could  see  exactly  what  to  do,  and  he  could  pick 
out  exactly  the  right  man  to  do  it.  No  wonder,  then,  that  as 
soon  as  he  came  into  power  the  British  began  to  gain  victories. 

88.  The  Victories   of   1758.  —  Once   more  the  French  were 
attacked  at  their  three  vulnerable  points;,  and  this  time  with 
success.      In   1758    Louisburg   surrendered   to   Amherst   and 
Boscawen.      In  that   same   year   Washington   captured   Fort 
Duquesne,  which,  in  honor  of  the  great  Prime  Minister,  was 
called  Fort  Pitt.     A  provincial  officer  named  Bradstreet  de 
stroyed  Fort  Frontenac  on  Lake  Ontario.     This  was  a  heavy 
blow  to  the  French;  for  with  Fort  Frontenac  gone  and  Fort 
Duquesne  in  English  hands,  the  Ohio  was  cut  off  from  Quebec. 

An  attack  on  Ticonderoga,  however,  was  repulsed  by  Mont- 
calm  with  dreadful  loss  to  the  English. 

89.  The  Victories  of  1759  ;  Wolfe.  —  But  the  defeat  was  only 
temporary.     At  the  siege  of  Louisburg  a  young  officer  named 
James  Wolfe  had  greatly  distinguished  himself,  and  in  return 
for  this  was  selected  by  Pitt  to  command  an  expedition  to 
Quebec.     The  previous  attempts  to  reach  that  city  had  been 
by  way  of  Lake  George.     The  expedition  of  Wolfe  sailed  up 
the  St.  Lawrence,  and  landed  below  the  city. 

Quebec  stands  on  the  summit  of  a  high  hill  with  precipitous 
sides,  and  was  then  the  most  strongly  fortified  city  in  America. 
To  take  it  seemed  almost  impossible.  But  the  resolution  of 
Wolfe  overcame  every  obstacle:  on  the  night  of  September 
12,  1759,  he  led  his  troops  to  the  foot  of  the  cliff,  climbed  the 
heights,  and  early  in  the  morning  had  his  army  drawn  up  in 
battle  array  on  the  Plains  of  Abraham,  as  the  plateau  behind 
the  city  was  called.  There  a  great  battle  was  fought  between 
the  French,  led  by  Montcalm,  and  the  British,  led  by  Wolfe. 


90 


THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 


90         Longitude 


from  Greenwich  70 


The  British  triumphed,  and  Quebec  fell ;  but  Wolfe  and  Mont- 
calm  were  among  the  dead.1 

Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point  had  been  captured  a  few  weeks 
before.  Montreal  was  taken  in  1760,  and  the  long  struggle 
between  the  French  and  the  English  in  America  ended  in  the 
defeat  of  the  French.  The  war  dragged  on  in  Europe  till 
1763,  when  peace  was  made  at  Paris. 

90.  France  driven  out  of  America. — With  all  the  details  of 
the  treaty  we  are  not  concerned.  It  is  enough  for  us  to 

1  Parkman's  Montcalm  and  Wolfe,  Chaps.  25-27;  A.  Wright's  Life  of 
Wolfe;  Sloan's  French  War  and  the  Revolution,  Chaps.  6-9. 


NEW  FRANCE   AND  LOUISIANA  91 

know  that  France  divided  her  possessions  on  this  continent 
between  Great  Britain  and  Spain.  To  Great  Britain  she  gave 
Canada  and  Cape  Breton,  and  all  the  islands  save  two  in  the 
Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence.  Entering  what  is  now  the  United  States, 
she  drew  a  line  down  the  middle  of  the  Mississippi  Eiver  from 
its  source  to  a  point  just  north  of  New  Orleans.  To  Great 
Britain  she  surrendered  all  her  territory  east  of  this  line.  To 
Spain  she  gave  all  her  possessions  to  the  west  of  this  line, 
together  with  the  city  of  New  Orleans.  But  Great  Britain, 
during  the  war,  had  taken  Havana  from  Spain.  To  get  this 
back,  Spain  now  gave  up  Florida  in  exchange. 

At  the  end  of  the  war  with  France,  Great  Britain  thus  found 
herself  in  possession  of  Canada  and  all  that  part  of  the  United 
States  which  lies  between  the  Atlantic  and  the  Mississippi,  the 
little  strip  at  the  mouth  of  the  river  alone  excepted. 

SUMMARY 

We  have  now  come  to  the  time  when  the  third  European  power  was 
driven  from  our  country.  The  first  was  Sweden  when  New  Sweden  was 
captured  by  the  Dutch.  The  second  was  Holland  when  New  Netherland 
was  captured  by  the  English.  The  third  was  France. 

1.  The  struggle  for  the  French  possessions  in  America  may  be  divided 

into  two  periods  :  A.  That  from  1689  to  1748,  when  the  contest  was 
for  Acadia  and  New  France.  B.  That  from  1754  to  1763,  when  the 
struggle  was  for  Louisiana  as  well  as  New  France. 

2.  The  first  war,  "  King  William's,"  was  indecisive,  but  the  second, 

"  Queen  Anne's,"  ended  (1713)  in  the  transfer  of  Acadia  to  England. 

3.  After  the  treaty  of  Utrecht,  1713,  the  French  began  seriously  to  take 

possession  of  the  Mississippi  valley,  and  began  a  chain  of  forts  to 
stretch  from  New  Orleans  and  Mobile  to  Montreal. 

4.  "King  George's  War"  interrupted  this  work  for  a  few  years  (1744- 

1748),  but  in  1749  Ce"loron  was  sent  to  bury  plates  in  the  valleys  of 
the  Allegheny  and  Ohio  and  claim  them  in  the  name  of  France. 

6.   The  next  step  after  claiming  the  valleys  was  to  take  armed  possession, 
and  in  1752  the  French  began  to  build  forts. 

6.  This  alarmed  the  governor  of  Virginia,  who  sent  Washington  to  bid 
the  French  leave  the  Allegheny  valley.  When  they  refused,  troops 
were  sent  to  build  a  fort  on  the  site  of  what  is  now  Pittsburg ;  but 
these  men,  under  Trent  and  Ward,  were  driven  away,  as  were  also 
the  reinforcements  under  Washington  (1764). 
McM.  HIST.— 6 


92 


THE  FRENCH  AND  THE  INDIANS 


7.  Braddock  (with  Washington)  was  next  sent  against  the  French,  who 

had  built  Fort  Duquesne.  He  was  ambushed  by  the  Indians  (July  9, 
1755),  defeated,  and  killed. 

8.  The  "French  and  Indian  War"  thus  opened  was  fought  with  varying 

success  till  1760,  when  the  British  held  Quebec,  Montreal,  Fort 
Duquesne,  and  all  the  other  French  strongholds  in  America.  In 
1763  peace  was  made,  and  nearly  all  the  French  possessions  east  of 
the  Mississippi  River  were  surrendered  to  the  British. 


O    U 

fc  << 


« § 


§ 

s  — 

«  ft 

O    fc 


1690.     Sir  W.  Phips  takes  Port  Royal. 
Sir  W.  Phips  attacks  Quebec. 
Montreal  attacked. 

1690-1697.     The  New  York  and  New  England 
frontier  ravaged  by   the    French   and   [ 
Indians. 

1697.  Peace  of  Ryswick.  Port  Royal  given 
back  to  the  French. 

1702-1713.  Frontier  of  New  England  ravaged. 

1710.  Port  Royal  again  taken. 

1711.  Quebec  again  attacked. 

1713.  Peace  of  Utrecht.  Acadia  held  by  the 
English. 

1744.  French  attack  Canso  and  Annapolis  (Port 

Royal). 

1745.  Louisburg  (Cape  Breton  Island)  taken. 

1748.  Louisburg  given  back  to  the  French. 

1699.  The  French  at  the  mouth  of  the  Missis 
sippi. 

1701.     The  occupation  of  the  valley  begun. 

1701-1748.  The  chain  of  forts  joining  New  Or 
leans  and  Montreal. 

1749.  The  French  on  the  Allegheny. 
Celeron's  expedition.     The  buried  plates. 

1753.  The  French  fortify  the  Allegheny  val 
ley. 

1754-1763.     The  struggle  for  final  possession. 

1758.  The  capture  of  Louisburg. 

1759.  The  capture  of  Quebec. 

1760.  The  capture  of  Montreal. 
1763.     The  French  abandon  America. 


THE    STRUGGLE    FOR    THE    RIGHTS    OF 
ENGLISHMEN 

CHAPTER   IX 

LIFE   IN  THE   COLONIES   IN   1763 

91.  Things  unknown  in  1763.  —  Had  a  traveler  landed  on  our 
shores  in  1763  and  made  a  journey  through  the  English  colo 
nies  in  America,  he  would  have  seen  a 
country  utterly  unlike  the  United  States 
of  to-day.  The  entire  population,  white 
man  and  black,  freeman  and  slave,  was 
not  so  great  as  that  of  New  York  or 
Philadelphia  or  Chicago  in  our  time. 
If  we  were  to  write  a  list  of  all  the 
things  we  now  consider  as  real  neces 
saries  of  daily  life  and  mark  off  those 
unknown  to  the  men  of  1763,  not  one 
quarter  would  remain.  No  man  in  the 
country  had  ever  seen  a  stove,  or  a  fur 
nace,  or  a  friction  match,  or  an  envel 
ope,  or  a  piece  of  mineral  coal.  From 
the  farmer  we  should  have  to  take  the 
reaper,  the  drill,  the  mowing  machine, 
and  every  kind  of  improved  rake  and  plow,  and  give  him  back 
the  scythe,  the  cradle,  and  the  flail.  From  our  houses  would 
go  the  sewing  machine,  the  daily  newspaper,  gas,  running 
water;  and  from  our  tables,  the  tomato,  the  cauliflower,  the 
eggplant,  and  many  varieties  of  summer  fruits.  We  should 
have  to  destroy  every  railroad,  every  steamboat,  every  factory 


Lamp  and  sadiron 


94 


STRUGGLE   FOB   RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 


and  mill,  pull  down  every  line  of  telegraph,  silence  every 
telephone,  put  out  every  electric  light,  and  tear  up  every  tele 
graphic  cable  from  the  beds  of  innumerable  rivers  and  seas. 
We  should  have  to  take  ether  and  chloroform  from  the  sur 
geon,  and  galvanized  iron  and  India  rubber  from  the  arts,  and 
give  up  every  sort  of  machine  moved  by  steam. 

92.    State  of  the  Arts,  Sciences,  and  Industry.  —  The  appli 
ances  left  on  the  list,  because  in  some  form  they  were  known 

to  the  men  of  1763,  would 
now  be  thought  crude  and 
clumsy.  There  were  print 
ing  presses  in  those  days, 
—  perhaps  fifty  in  all  the 
colonies.  But  they  were 
small,  were  worked  by 
hand,  and  were  so  slow  that 
the  most  expert  pressman 
using  one  of  them  could 
not  have  printed  so  much 
in  three  working  days  as  a  modern  steam  press  can  run  off 
in  five  minutes.  There  was  a  general  post,  and  Benjamin 
Franklin  was  deputy  postmaster-general  for  the  northern 
district  of  the  colonies.  But  the  letters  were  carried  thirty 
miles  a  day  by  postriders  on  horseback,  and  there  were  never 
more  than  three  mails  a  week  between  even  the  great  towns. 
Every  Monday,  Wednesday,  and  Friday  a  postrider  left  New 
York  city  for  Philadelphia.  Every  Monday  and  Thursday 
another  left  New  York  for  Boston.  Once  each  week  a  rider 
left  for  Albany  on  his  way  to  Quebec.  On  the  first  Wednes 
day  of  each  month  a  packet  boat  sailed  from  New  York  for 
Falmouth,  England,  with  the  mail,  and  this  was  the  only  mail 
between  Great  Britain  and  her  American  colonies.  We  put 
electricity  to  a  thousand  uses  ;  but  in  1763  it  was  a  scientific 
toy.  Franklin  had  just  proved  by  his  experiment  with  the 
kite  that  lightning  and  electricity  were  one  and  the  same,  and 
1  From  an  old  print,  1760. 


Postrider* 


LIFE   IN  THE   COLONIES   IN   1763  95 

several  other  men  were  amusing  themselves  and  their  hearers 
by  ringing  bells,  exploding  powder,  and  making  colored  sparks. 
But  it  was  put  to  no  other  use.  If  we  take  up  a  daily  news 
paper  published  in  one  of  our  great  cities  and  read  the  column 
of  wants,  we  find  in  them  twenty  occupations  now  giving  a 
comfortable  living  to  millions  of  men.  Yet  not  one  of  these 
twenty  existed  in  1763.  The  district  messenger,  the  telegraph 
operator,  the  typewriter,  the  stenographer,  the  bookkeeper,  the 
canvasser,  the  salesman,  the  commercial  traveler,  the  engi 
neer,  the  car  driver,  the  hackman,  the  conductor,  the  gripman, 
the  brakeman,  the  electrician,  the  lineman,  the  elevator  boy, 
and  a  host  of  others,  follow  trades  and  occupations  which  had 
no  existence  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

UN    away,  the  23d  of  this 

Jnftant  January  from  Silas  Crifoln  of 
Burlington,  Taylor,  a  Servant  Man  na 
med  W$b  Morrh,  by  Trade  a  Taylor, 
aged  about  22  Years,  of  a  middle  Sta 
ture,  fwarthy  Complexion,  light  gray 
Eyes,  fm  Hair  clipp'd  off,  marVd  with 
a  large  pit  of  the  Small  Pox  on  one 
Cheek  near  his  Eye,  had  on  when  he 
wnt  away  a  good  Felt  Hat,  a  yelowifh 
r*  *r  *.  Dr^et1CoatwithPieitsbchind,  anold 

Ozenbngs  Veft  two  Ozenbrigs  Shirts,  a  pair  of  Leather 
Breeches  handfomely  worm'd  and  flower'd  up  th-  Knees 
yarn  Stockings  and  good  round  toc'd  Shoes  Took  with 
him  a  large  pair  of  Sheers  crack'd  in  one  of  the  Bows,  & 
mark'd  with  ihe  Word  [Saw]. 
laid  Servant  and  fecurcs  Mm 


bin  :  agam,  Aall  have  7b,ee  Pm^  Reward  befide 
nable  Charges,       paid  by  me 


From  a  Philadelphia  newspaper 


93.  Labor.  —  On  the  other  hand,  if  we  take  up  a  newspaper 
of  that  day  and  read  the  advertisements,  we  find-that  a  great 
deal  of  what  existed  then  does  not.  exist  now.  The  newspapers 
were  published  in  a  few  of  the  large  towns,  and  appeared  not 


96  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 

every  day,  but  once  a  week.  In  the  largest  of  them  would  be 
from  seventy-five  to  eighty  advertisements,  setting  forth  that 
such  a  merchant  had  just  received  from  England  or  the  West 
Indies  a  stock  of  new  goods  which  he  would  sell  for  cash;  that 
the  Charming  Nancy  would  sail  in  a  few  weeks  for  London- 


To  Be  DISPOSED  of, 
A  Likely  Servant  Mans  Time  for  4  Years 

JTjL  who  is  very  well  Qualified  for  a  Clerk  or  to  teach 
a  School,  he  Reads,  Writes,  underftands  Arithmetick  and 
Accomptsvery  well,  Enquire  of  the  Printer  hereof. 

Lately  improted  from  Antigua 

and  to  be  Sold  by  Edward  Jones  in 
Ifacc  Norris'j  Alky. 

A  PARCEL  of  likely  Ne- 
groWomen  &GirIs  from  thirteen 

^_  „-    _   to  one  and  twenty  Years  of  age,  and  have 

all  had  the  Small-Pox. 

To  Be  SOLD, 

TWO  verly    likely   Negroe 
Boys,  Enquire  of  Capr.  Benjamin  Cbrif- 
tiani  at  his  Houfe  in  Arch-Street. 

Alfo  a  Quantity  of  very  good  Lime-juice 
to  be  Sold  cheap. 


From  a  Philadelphia  newspaper 

derry  in  Ireland,  or  for  Barbados,  or  for  Amsterdam  in  Holland, 
and  wanted  a  cargo;  that  a  tract  of  land  or  a  plantation  would 
be  sold  "at  vendue,"  or,  as  we  say,  at  auction;  that  a  reward 
of  five  pistoles  would  be  paid  for  the  arrest  of  "  a  lusty  negroe 
man"  or  an  "indented  servant"  or  an  "apprentice  lad,"  who 
had  run  away  from  his  owner  or  master.  Very  rarely  is  a 
call  made  for  a  mechanic  or  a  workman  of  any  sort. 


LIFE   IN  THE   COLONIES   IN   1763  97 


The  reason  for  this  was  two  fold.  In  the  first  place,  negro 
slavery  existed  in  all  the  thirteen  colonies.  In  the  second 
place,  there  were  thousands  of  whites  in  many  of  the  colonies 
in  a  state  of  temporary  servitude,  which  was  sometimes  volun 
tary  and  sometimes  involuntary. 

Those  who  served  against  their  will  were  convicts  and  felons, 
not  only  men  and  women  who  had  been  guilty  of  stealing, 
cheating,  and  the  like,  but  also  forgers,  counterfeiters,  and  mur 
derers,  who  were  transported  by  thousands  from  the  English 
prisons  to  the  colonies  and  sold  into  slavery  or  service  for 
seven  or  fourteen  years.1  Advertisements  are  extant  in  which 
the  masters  from  whom  such  servants  have  run  away  warn 
the  people  to  beware  of  them. 

But  all  "indented"  or  bond  servants  were  not  criminals. 
Many  were  reputable  persons  who  sold  themselves  into  service 
for  a  term  of  years  in  return  for  transportation  to  America. 
Others,  generally  boys  and  young  women,  had  been  kidnaped 
and  sold  by  the  persons  who  stole  them. 

94.  Indentured  Servants.  —  In  the  case  of  such  as  came  vol 
untarily,  carefully  drawn  agreements  called  indentures  would 
be  made  in  writing.  The  captain  of  the  ship  would  agree  to 
bring  the  emigrant  to  America.  The  emigrant  would  agree  in 
return  to  serve  the  captain  three  or  five  years.  When  the 
ship  reached  port,  the  captain  would  advertise  the  fact  that  he 
had  carpenters,  tailors,  farmers,  shoemakers,  etc.,  for  sale,  and 
whoever  wanted  such  labor  would  go  on  board  the  ship  and 
for  perhaps  fifty  dollars  buy  a  man  bound  to  serve  him  for 
several  years  in  return  for  food,  clothes,  and  lodging.  Not 
only  men,  but  also  women  and  children,  were  sold  in  this  way, 
and  were  known  as  "indented  servants,"  or  "redemptioners," 
because  they  redeemed  their  time  of  service  with  labor.  Their 

1  One  act  of  Parliament,  for  instance,  provided  that  persons  sentenced 
to  be  whipped  or  branded  might,  if  they  wished,  escape  the  punishment 
by  serving  seven  years  in  the  colonies,  and  never  returning  to  England. 
Another  allowed  convicts  sentenced  to  death  to  commute  the  sentence  by 
serving  fourteen  years. 


98  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

lot  seems  to  have  been  a  hard  one;  for  the  young  men  were 
constantly  running  away,  and  the  newspapers  are  full  of  ad 
vertisements  offering  rewards  for  their  arrest. 

What  we  call  the  workingman,  the  day  laborer,  the  me 
chanic,  the  mill  hand,  had  no  existence  as  classes.  The  great 
corporations,  railroads,  express  companies,  mills,  factories  of 
every  sort,  which  now  cover  our  land  and  give  employment 
to  five  times  as  many  men  and  women  as  lived  in  all  the  colo 
nies  in  1763,  are  the  creatures  of  our  own  time. 

95.  No  Manufacturers. — For  this  state  of  things  England 
was  largely  to  blame.  For  one  hundred  years  past  every  kind 

of  manufacture  that  could  com 
pete  with  the  manufactures  of  the 
mother  country  had  been  crushed 
by  law.  In  order  to  help  her  iron 

makers,    she  forbade  the  colonists 
Wigs  and  wig  bag  . 

to  set  up  iron  furnaces  and  slitting 

mills.     That  her  cloth  manufacturers  might  flourish,  she  for 
bade  the  colonists  to  send  their  woolen  goods  to  any 
country  whatever,   or  even  from  one  colony  to  an 
other.     Under  this  law  it  was  a  crime  to  knit  a  pair 
of  mittens  or  a  pair  of  socks  and  send 
them  from  Boston  to  Providence  or 
from  New  York  to  Newark,   or  from 
Philadelphia  across  the  Delaware  to 
New  Jersey.     In  the  interest  of  Eng 
lish  hatters  the  colonists  were  not  al 
lowed  to  send  hats  to  any  foreign 
country,    nor   from    one    colony  to 
another,    and  a  serious  effort  was 

made  to  prevent  the   manufacture 

PI          -A          •          -r.        i     •     A  i  •  Flax  wheel 

of  hats  in  America.    People  in  this 

country  were  obliged  to  wear  English-made  hats.  Taking  the 
country  through,  every  saw,  every  ax,  every  hammer,  every 
needle,  pin,  tack,  piece  of  tape,  and  a  hundred  other  articles 
of  daily  use  came  from  Great  Britain. 


LIFE   IN  THE   COLONIES  IN   1763 


99 


Every  farmhouse,  however,  was  a  little  factory,  and  every 
farmer  a  jack-of -all-trades.  He  and  his  sons  made  their  own 
shoes,  beat  out  nails  and 
spikes,  hinges,  and  every 
sort  of  ironmongery, 
and  constructed  much  of 
the  household  furniture. 
The  wife  and  her  daugh 
ters  manufactured  the 
clothing,  from  dressing 
the  flax  and  carding  the 
wool  to  cutting  the 
cloth;  knit  the  mittens 
and  socks;  and  during 
the  winter  made  straw 
bonnets  to  sell  in  the 
towns  in  the  spring. 

Even  in   such   towns 
as  were  large  enough  to  Hand  looml 

support  a  few  artisans, 

each  made,  with  the  help  of  an  apprentice,    and  perhaps  a 
journeyman,  all  the  articles  he  sold. 

96.  The  Cities.  — If  we  take  a  map  of  our  country  and  run 
over  the  great  cities  of  to-day,  we  find  that  except  along  the 
seacoast  hardly  one  existed,  in  1765,  even  in  name.  Detroit 
was  a  little  French  settlement  surrounded  with  a  high  stock 
ade.  New  Orleans  existed,  and  St.  Louis  had  just  been 
founded,  but  they  both  belonged  to  Spain.  Mobile  and  Pen- 
sacola  and  Natchez  and  Vincennes  consisted  of  a  few  huts 
gathered  about  old  French  forts.  There  was  no  city,  no 
town  worthy  of  the  name,  in  the  English  colonies  west  of 
the  Alleghany  Mountains.  Along  the  Atlantic  coast  we  find 
Portsmouth,  Boston,  Providence,  New  Haven,  New  York, 
Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  Alexandria,  William sburg,  Charles 
ton,  Savannah,  and  others  of  less  note.  But  the  largest  of 
1  From  an  old  loom  in  the  National  Museum,  Washington. 


100 


STRUGGLE   FOB   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 


these  were  mere  collections  of  a  few  hundred  houses  ranged 
along  streets,  none  of  which  were  sewered  and  few  of  which 
were  paved  or  lighted.  The  watchman  went  his  rounds  at 
night  with  rattle  and  lantern,  called  out  the  hours  and  the 
state  of  the  weather,  and  stopped  and  demanded  the  name 


Colonial  mansion  in  Charleston 

of  every  person  found  walking  the  streets  after  nine  o'clock. 
To  travel  on  Sunday  was  a  serious  and  punishable  offense,  as 
it  was  on  any  day  to  smoke  in  the  streets,  or  run  from  house 
to  house  with  hot  coals,  which  in  those  days,  when  there  were 
no  matches,  were  often  used  instead  of  flint  and  steel  to  light 
fires. 

Travel  between  the  large  towns  was  almost  entirely  by  sail 
ing  vessel,  or  on  horseback.  The  first  stagecoach-and-four  in 
New  England  began  its  trips  in  1744.  The  first  stage  between 
New  York  and  Philadelphia  was  not  set  up  till  1756,  and  spent 
three  days  on  the  road. 

97.  The  Three  Groups  of  Colonies.  —  It  has  always  been  usual 
to  arrange  the  colonies  in  three  groups:  1.  The  Eastern  or 


LIFE   IN  THE  COLONIES  IN~.n63 


New  England  Colonies  (New  Hampshire,  Massachusetts,  Rhode 
Island,  and  Connecticut).  2.  The  Middle  Colonies  (New  York, 
New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  Delaware).  3.  The  Southern 
Colonies -(Maryland,  Virginia,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina, 
and  Georgia).  Now,  this  arrangement  is  good  not  only  from  a 
geographical  point  of  view,  but  also  because  the  people,  the 
customs,  the  manners,  the  occupations,  in  each  of  these  groups 
were  very  unlike  the  people  and  the  ways  of  living  in  the 
others. 

98.    Occupations  in  New  England.  —  In  New  England  the  col 
onists  were  almost  entirely  English,  though  there  were  some 


New  England  mansion 

Scotch,  some  Scotch-Irish,  a  few  Huguenot  refugees  from 
France,  and,  in  Rhode  Island,  a  few  Portuguese  Jews.  As 
the  climate  and  soil  did  not  admit  of  raising  any  great 
staple,  such  as  rice  or  tobacco,  the  people  "  took  to  the  sea." 
They  cut  down  trees,  with  which  the  land  was  covered,  built 
ships,  and  sailed  away  to  the  Grand  Banks  off  Newfound 
land  for  cod,  and  to  the  whale  fisheries  for  oil.  They  went  to 


102 


"FOB  RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 


the  English,  Dutch,  and  Spanish  West  Indian  Islands,  with 
flour,  salt  meat,  horses,  oxen;  with  salted  salmon,  cod,  and 
mackerel ;  with  staves  for  barrels  ;  with  onions  and  salted  oys 
ters.  In  return,  they  came  back  with  sugar,  molasses,  cotton, 
wool,  logwood,  and  Spanish  dollars  with  which  the  New  Eng 
land  Colonies  paid  for  the  goods  they  took  from  England. 
They  went  to  Spain,  where  their  ships  were  often  sold,  the 
captains  chartering  English  vessels  and  coming  home  with  car 
goes  of  goods  made  in  England.  Six  hundred  ships  are  said  to 
have  been  employed  in  the  foreign  trade  of  Boston,  and  more 

than  a  thousand  in  the 
fisheries  and  the  trade 
along  the  coast. 

Farming,  outside  of 
Connecticut,  yielded  lit 
tle  more  than  a  bare  sub 
sistence.  Manufactures 
in  general  were  forbidden 
by  English  law.  Paper 


and  hats  were  made  in 
small  quantities,  leather 
was  tanned,  lumber  was 
sawed,  and  rum  was  dis 
tilled  from  molasses ;  but 
it  was  on  homemade  man 
ufactures  that  the  people 
depended. 

99.  Occupations  in  the 
Middle  Colonies.  — In  the 
Middle  Colonies  the  pop 
ulation  was  a  mixture  of  people  from  many  European  countries. 
The  line  of  little  villages  which  began  at  the  west  end  of  Long 
Island  and  stretched  up  the  Hudson  to  Albany,  and  out  the 
Mohawk  to  Schenectady  —  the  settled  part  of  New  York  — 
contained  Englishmen,  Irishmen,  Dutchmen,  French  Hugue- 
1  From  an  old  print. 


Dutch  house  at  Albany1 


LIFE   IN   THE   COLONIES   IN   1763  103 

nots,  Germans  from  the  Rhine  countries,  and  negroes  from 
Africa.  The  chief  occupations  of  those  people  were  farming, 
making  flour,  and  carrying  on  an  extensive  commerce  with  Eng 
land,  Spain,  and  the  West  Indian  Islands. 

In  New  Jersey  the  population  was  almost  entirely  English, 
but  in  Pennsylvania  it  was  as  mixed  as  in  New  York.  Around 
Philadelphia  the  English  predominated, 
but  with  them  were  mingled  Swedes,  Dutch, 
Welsh,  Germans,  and  Scotch-Irish.  Taken 
together,  the  Germans  and  the  Scotch-Irish 
far  outnumbered  the  English,  and  made  up 
the  mass  of  the  population  between  the 
Schuylkill  and  the  Susquehanna  rivers. 
Both  were  self-willed  and  stubborn,  and 
they  were  utterly  unable  to  get  along  to-  Shoes  worn  by  Palatines 
gether  peaceably,  so  that  their  settlements 
ran  across  the  state  in  two  parallel  bands,  in  one  of  which 
whole  regions  could  be  found  in  which  not  a  word  of  English 
was  spoken.  Indeed,  then,  and  long  after  the  nineteenth 
century  began,  the  laws  of  Pennsylvania  were  printed  both  in 
English  and  in  German.  The  chief  occupation  of  the  people 
was  farming ;  and  it  is  safe  to  say  that  no  such  farms,  no  such 
cattle,  no  such  grain,  flour,  provisions,  could  be  found  in  any 
other  part  of  the  country.  Lumber,  too,  was  cut  and  sold  in 
great  quantities ;  and  along  the  frontier  there  was  a  lively  fur 
trade  with  the  Indians.  At  Philadelphia  was  centered  a  fine 
trade  with  Europe  and  the  West  Indies.  Had  it  not  been  for 
the  action  of  the  mother  country,  manufactures  would  have 
flourished  greatly ;  even  as  it  was,  iron  and  paper  were  manu 
factured  in  considerable  quantities. 

100.  Occupations  in  the  Southern  Colonies.  —  South  of  Pennsyl 
vania,  and  especially  south  of  the  Potomac  Kiver,  lay  a  region 
utterly  unlike  anything  to  the  north  of  it.  In  Virginia,  there 
were  no  cities,  no  large  towns,  no  centers  of  population.  At 
an  early  day  in  the  history  of  the  colony  the  legislature  had 
attempted  to  remedy  this,  and  had  ordered  towns  to  be  built 


104  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

at  certain  places,  had  made  them  the  only  ports  where  ships 
from  abroad  could  be  entered,  had  established  tobacco  ware 
houses  in  them,  had  offered  special  privileges  to  tradesmen  who 
would  settle  in  them,  and  had  provided  that  each  should  have 
a  market  and  a  fair.  But  the  success  was  small,  and  Fredericks- 
burg  and  Alexandria  and  Petersburg  were  straggling  villages. 
Jamestown,  the  old  capital,  had  by  this  time  ceased  to  exist. 
Williamsburg.  the  new  capital,  was  a  village  of  200  houses. 
There  was  no  business,  no  incentive  in  Virginia  to  build  towns. 
The  planters  owned  immense  planta 
tions  along  the  river  banks,  and  raised 
tobacco,  which,  when  gath 
ered,  cured,  and 
packed  into 
hogsheads, 


Tobacco  rotting  *  «       ,   - 

rolled  away  to  the  nearest  wharf  for 

inspection  and  shipment  to  London.  In  those  early  days, 
when  good  roads  were  unknown  and  wagons  few.  shafts  were 
attached  to  each  hogshead  by  iron  bolts  driven  into  the  heads, 
and  the  cask  was  thus  turned  into  a  huge  roller.  With  each 
year's  crop  would  go  a  long  list  of  articles  of  every  sort,  — 
hardware,  glass,  crockery,  clothing,  furniture,  household  uten 
sils,  wines,  —  which  the  agent  was  instructed  to  buy  with  the 
proceeds  of  the  tobacco  and  send  back  to  the  planter  when 
the  ships  came  a  year  later  for  another  crop.  The  country 
abounded  in  trees,  yet  tables,  chairs,  boxes,  cart  wheels,  bowls, 
birch  brooms,  all  came  from  the  mother  country.  The  wood 
used  for  building  houses  was  actually  cut,  sent  to  England  as 
logs  to  be  dressed,  and  then  taken  back  to  Virginia  for  use. 

Maryland  was  in  the  same  condition.  Her  people  raised 
tobacco,  and  with  it  bought  their  clothing,  household  goods, 
brass  and  copper  wares,  and  iron  utensils  in  Great  Britain. 

In  South  Carolina  rice  was  the  great  staple,  just  as  tobacco 

was  the  staple  of  Virginia,  and  there  too  were  large  planta 

tions  and  no   towns.     All   the  social,  commercial,  legal,  and. 

1  From  a  model  in  the  National  Museum,  Washington. 


LITE   Ds    THE   COLONIES   Ds    1763 


105 


An  old  Maryland  manor  house 

political  life  of  the  colony  centered  in  Charleston,  from  which 
a  direct  trade  was  carried  on  with  London. 

Labor  on  the  plantations  of  Virginia,  the  two  Carolinas,  and 
Georgia  was  performed  exclusively  by  negro  slaves  and  redemp- 
tioners. 

101.  Civil  Government  in  the  English  Colonies.  —  If  we  arrange 
the  colonies  according  to  the  kind  of  civil  government  in 
each,  we  find  that  they  fall  into  three  classes : 

1.  The  charter  colonies  (Connecticut,  Massachusetts,  and  Rhode 

Island). 

2.  The   proprietary    colonies    (Pennsylvania,   Delaware,    and 

Maryland). 

3.  The  royal,  or  provincial,  colonies  (Xew  Hampshire.   Xew 

York,  Xew  Jersey,  Virginia,  North  and  South  Carolina, 
and  Georgia). 

The  charters  of  the  first  group  were  written  contracts  between 
the  King  and  the  colonists,  defined  the  share  each  should  have 
in  the  government,  and  were  not  to  be  changed  without  the 


106  STRUGGLE   FOE  RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

consent  of  both  parties.  In  colonies  of  the  second  group  some 
individual,  called  the  proprietary,  was  granted  a  great  tract  of 
land  by  the  King,  and,  under  a  royal  charter,  was  given  power 
to  sell  the  land  to  settlers,  establish  government,  and  appoint 
the  governors  of  his  colony.  In  the  third  group,  the  King 
appointed  the  governors  and  instructed  them  as  to  the  way  in 
which  he  wished  his  colonies  to  be  ruled. 

With  these  differences,  all  the  colonies  had  the  same  form  of 
government.  In  each  there  was  a  legislature  elected  by  the 
people;  in  each  the  right  to  vote  was  limited  to  men  who 
owned  land,  paid  taxes,  had  a  certain  yearly  income,  and  were 
members  of  some  Christian  church.  The  legislature  consisted 
of  two  branches :  the  lower  house,  to  which  the  people  elected 
delegates ;  and  the  upper  house,  or  council,  appointed  by  the 
governor.  These  legislatures  could  do  many  things,  but  their 
powers  were  limited  and  their  acts  were  subject  to  review: 

1.  They  could  do  nothing  contrary  to  the  laws  of  England. 

2.  Whatever  they  did  could  be  vetoed  by  the  governors,  and 
no  bill  could  be  passed  over  the  veto.     3.    All  laws  passed  by 
a  colonial  legislature  (except  in  the  case  of  Connecticut,  Ehode 
Island,  and  Maryland),  and  approved  by  a  governor,  must  even 
then  be  sent  to  England  to  be  examined  by  the  King  in  Coun 
cil,  and  could  be  "  disallowed  "  or  vetoed  by  the  King  at  any 
time  within  three  years.     This  power  was  used  so  constantly 
that  the  colonial  legislatures,  in  time,  would  pass  laws  to  run 
for  two  years,  and  when  that  time  expired  would  reenact  them 
for  two  years  more,  and  so  on  in  order  to  avoid  the  veto.    In  this 
way  the  colonists  became  used  to  three  political  institutions 
which  were  afterwards  embodied  in  what  is  now  the  American 
system   of   state   and  national  government:     1.  The  written 
constitution  defining  the  powers  of  government.     2.    The  exer 
cise  of  the  veto  power  by  the  governor.     3.    The  setting  aside 
of  laws  by  a  judicial  body  from  whose  decision  there  is  no 
appeal. 

102.  The  Colonial  Governors.  —  The  governor  of  a  royal  prov 
ince  was  the  personal  representative  of  the  King,  and  as  such 


LIFE   IN  THE   COLONIES   IN   1763  107 

had  vast  power.  The  legislature  could  meet  only  when  he 
called  it.  He  could  at  any  moment  prorogue  it  (that  is,  com 
mand  it  to  adjourn  to  a  certain  day)  or  dissolve  it,  and,  if  the 
King  approved,  he  need  never  call  it  together  again.  He  was 
the  chief  justice  of  the  highest  colonial  court,  he  appointed 
all  the  judges,  and,  as  commander  in  chief  of  the  militia, 
appointed  all  important  officers.  Yet  even  he  was  subject  to 
some  control,  for  his  salary  was  paid  by  the  colony  over  which 
he  ruled,  and,  by  refusing  to  pay  this  salary,  the  legislature 
could,  and  over  and  over  again  did,  force  him  to  approve  acts 
he  would  not  otherwise  have  sanctioned.  In  Connecticut  and 
Rhode  Island  the  people  elected  the  governors.  This  right 
once  existed  also  in  Massachusetts ;  but  when  the  old  charter 
was  swept  away  in  1684,  and  replaced  by  a  new  one  in  1691, 
the  King  was  given  power  to  appoint  the  governor,  who  could 
summon,  dissolve,  and  prorogue  the  legislature  at  his  pleasure. 

103.  Lords  of  Trade  and  Plantations.  —  That  the  King  should 
give  personal  attention  to  all  the  details  of  government  in  his 
colonies  in  America,  was  not  to  be  expected.  In  1696,  there 
fore,  a  body  called  the  Lords  of  the  Board  of  Trade  and  Plan 
tations  was  commissioned  by  the  King  to  do  this  work  for  him. 
These  Lords  of  Trade  corresponded  with  the  governors,  made 
recommendations,  bade  them  carry  out  this  or  that  policy,  veto 
this  or  that  class  of  laws,  examined  all  the  laws  sent  over  by 
the  legislatures,  and  advised  the  King  as  to  which  should  be 
disallowed,  or  vetoed. 

In  the  early  years  of  our  colonial  history  the  Parliament  of 
England  had  no  share  in  the  direction  of  colonial  affairs.  It 
was  the  King  who  owned  all  the  land,  made  all  the  grants, 
gave  all  the  charters,  created  all  the  colonies,  governed  many 
of  them,  and  stoutly  denied  the  right  of  Parliament  to  meddle. 
But  when  Charles  I.  was  beheaded,  the  Long  Parliament  took 
charge  of  the  management  of  affairs  in  this  country,  and  al 
though  much  of  it  went  back  to  the  King  at  the  Restoration  in 
1660,  Parliament  still  continued  to  legislate  for  the  colonies 
in  a  few  matters.  Thus,  for  instance,  Parliament  by  one  act 
McM.  HIST,  —  7 


108  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

established  the  postal  service,  and  fixed  the  rates  of  postage ; 
by  another  it  regulated  the  currency,  and  by  another  required 
the  colonists  to  change  from  the  Old  Style  to  the  New  Style 
—  that  is,  to  stop  using  the  Julian  calendar  and  to  count  time 
in  future  by  the  Gregorian  calendar ;  by  another  it  established 
a  uniform  law  of  naturalization  ;  and  from  time  to  time  it  passed 
acts  for  the  purpose  of  regulating  colonial  trade. 

104.    Acts  of  Trade  and  Navigation.  —  The  number  of  these 
acts  is  very  large  ;  but  their  purpose  was  four  fold : 

1.  They  required  that  colonial  trade  should  be  carried  on  in 

ships  built  and  owned  in  England  or  in  the  colonies, 
and  manned  to  the  extent  of  two  thirds  of  the  crew  by 
English  subjects. 

2.  They  provided  a  long  list  of  colonial  products  that  should 

not  be  sent  to  any  foreign  ports  other  than  a  port  of 
England.  Goods  or  products  not  in  the  list  might  be 
sent  to  any  other  part  of  the  world.  Thus  tobacco,  sugar, 
indigo,  copper,  furs,  rice  (if  the  rice  was  for  a  port  north 
of  Cape  Finisterre),  must  go  to  England;  but  lumber, 
salt  fish,  and  provisions  might  go  (in  English  or  colonial 
ships)  to  France,  or  Spain,  or  to  other  foreign  countries. 

3.  When  trade  began  to  spring  up  between  the  colonies,  and 

the  New  England  merchants  Avere  competing  in  the  colo 
nial  markets  with  English  merchants,  an  act  was  passed 
providing  that  if  a  product  which  went  from  one  colony 
to  another  was  of  a  kind  that  might  have  been  supplied 
from  England,  it  must  either  go  to  the  mother  country 
and  then  to  the  purchasing  colony,  or  pay  an  export  duty 
at  the  port  where  it  was  shipped,  equal  to  the  import 
duty  it  would  have  to  pay  in  England. 

4.  No   goods  were  allowed  to  be  carried  from   any  place  in 

Europe  to  America  unless  they  were  first  landed  at  a 
port  in  England.1 

1  Edward  Eggleston's  papers  in  the  Century  Magazine,  1884  ;  Scudder's 
Men  and  Manners  One  Hundred  Years  Ago ;  Lodge's  English  Colonies. 


LIFE  IN  THE   COLONIES   IN   1763 


109 


SUMMARY 

1.  The  men  who  began  the  long  struggle  for  the  rights  of  Englishmen 

lived  in  a  state  of  society  very  different  from  ours,  and  were  utterly 
ignorant  of  most  of  the  commonest  things  we  use  in  daily  life. 

2.  Labor  was  performed  by  slaves,  by  criminals  sent  over  to  the  colonies 

and  sold,  and  by  "indented  servants,"  or  "redemptioners." 

3.  Manufactures  were  forbidden  by  the  laws  of  trade.    Nobody  was  per 

mitted  to  manufacture  iron  beyond  the  state  of  pig  or  bar  iron,  or 
make  woolen  goods  for  export,  or  make  hats. 

4.  Taking  the  colonies  in  geographical  groups,  the  Eastern  were  engaged 

in  fishing,  in  commerce,  and  in  farming ;  the  Middle  Colonies  were 
agricultural  and  commercial ;  the  Southern  were  wholly  agricul 
tural,  and  raised  two  great  staples  —  rice  and  tobacco. 

£.  As  a  consequence,  town  life  existed  in  the  Eastern  and  Middle  Colo 
nies,  and  was  little  known  in  the  South,  particularly  in  Virginia. 

6.  Over  the  colonies,  as  a  great  governing  body  to  aid  the  King,  were  the 
Lords  of  Trade  and  Plantations  in  London.  Under  them  in 
America  were  the  royal  and  proprietary  governors,  who  with  the 
local  colonial  legislatures  managed  the  affairs  of  the  colonies. 


Labor. 


Population. 

Implements  and  inventions  unknown. 

The  printing  press.. 

The  postal  service. 

Trades  and  occupations  then  unknown. 

f  The  apprentice. 

I  The  "  indented  servant." 

1  The  redemptioner. 

(  The  slave. 
No  manufactures.  (  Iron  making. 

Acts  of  trade  regulating      -j  Cloth  making. 
The  cities.  (  Hat  making. 

Travel. 

The  Navigation  Acts. 
State  of  agriculture. 

The  charter  colonies. 

The  proprietary  colonies. 

The  royal  colonies. 

The  colonial  governor. 

The  Lords  of  Trade  and  Plantations. 

The  King. 


CHAPTER   X 

"LIBERTY,  PROPERTY,  AND   NO    STAMPS" 

105.  The  New  Provinces.  —  The  acquisition  of  Canada  and 
the  Mississippi  valley  made  it  necessary  for  England  to  pro 
vide  for  their  defense  and  government.     To  do  this  she  began 
by  establishing  three  new  provinces. 

In  Canada  she  marked  out  the  province  of  Quebec,  part  of 
the  south  boundary  of  which  is  now  the  north  boundary  of 
New  York,  Vermont,  New  Hampshire,  and  Maine. 

In  the  South,  out  of  the  territory  given  by  Spain,  she  made 
two  provinces,  East  and  West  Florida.  The  north  boundary 
of  West  Florida  was  (1764)  a  parallel  of  latitude  through  the 
junction  of  the  Yazoo  and  Mississippi  rivers.  The  north 
boundary  of  East  Florida  was  part  of  the  boundary  of  the  pres 
ent  state.  The  territory  between  the  Altamaha  and  the  St. 
Marys  rivers  was  "annexed  to  Georgia." 

106.  The   Proclamation   Line.  —  By   the   same  proclamation 
which  established  these  provinces,  a  line  was  drawn  around 
the  head  waters  of  all  the  rivers  in  the  United  States  which 
flow  into  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  and  the  colonists  were  forbidden 
to  settle  to  the  west  of  it.      All  the  valley  from  the  Great 
Lakes  to  West  Florida,  and  from  the  proclamation  line  to  the 
Mississippi,  was  set  apart  for  the  Indians. 

107.  The  Country  to  be  defended.  —  Having  thus  provided  for 
the  government  of  the  newly  acquired  territory,  it  next  be 
came  necessary  to  provide  for  its  defense ;  for  nobody  doubted 
that  both  France  and  Spain  would  some  day  attempt  to  regain 
their  lost  possessions.     Arrangements  were  therefore  made  to 
bring  over  an  army  of  10,000  regular  troops,  scatter  them  over 

110 


92  87. 


THE  BRITISH  COLOXIES 

IN 

1761 


111 


112  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

the  country  from  Canada  to  Florida,  and  maintain  them  partly 
at  the  expense  of  the  colonies  and  partly  at  the  expense  of 
the  crown. 

The  share  to  be  paid  by  the  colonies  was  to  be  raised 

1.  By  enforcing  the  old  trade  and  navigation  laws. 

2.  .  By  a  tax  on  sugar  and  molasses  brought  into  the  country. 

3.  By  a  stamp  tax. 

108.  Trial  without  Jury.  —  In  order  to  enforce  the  old  laws, 
naval  vessels  were  sent  to  sail  up  and  down  the  coast  and  catch 
smugglers.     Offenders  when  seized  were  to  be  tried  in  some 
vice-admiralty  court,  where  they  could  not  have  trial  by  jury.1 

109.  The  Sugar  Act  and  Stamp  Tax.  —  The  Sugar  Act  was  not 
a  new  grievance.     In  1733  Parliament  laid  a  tax  of  6d.  a  gallon 
on  molasses  and  5s.  per  hundredweight  on  sugar  brought  into 
this  country  from  any  other  place  than  the  British  West  Indies. 
This  was  to  force  the  colonists  to  buy  their  sugar  and  molasses 
from  nobody  but   British  sugar   planters.     After  having  ex 
pired  five  times  and  been  five  times  reenacted,  the  Sugar  Act 
expired   for  the  sixth  time  in  1763,  and  the  colonies  begged 
that  it  might  not  be  renewed.     But  Parliament  merely  reduced 
the  molasses  duty  to  3d.,  and  laid  new  duties  on  coffee,  French 
and  East  Indian  goods,  indigo,  white  sugar,  and  Spanish  and 
Portuguese  wines.     It  then  resolved  that  "  for  further  defray 
ing  the  expense  of  protecting  the  colonists  it  would  be  neces 
sary  to  charge  certain  stamp  duties  in  the  colonies." 

At  that  time,  1764,  no  such  thing  as  an  internal  tax  laid  by 
Parliament  for  the  purpose  of  raising  revenue  existed,  or  ever 
had  existed,  in  America.  Money  for  the  use  of  the  King  had 
always  been  raised  by  taxes  imposed  by  the  legislatures  of  the 
colonies.  The  moment,  therefore,  the  people  heard  that  this 
money  was  to  be  raised  in  future  by  parliamentary  taxation, 
they  became  much  alarmed,  and  the  legislatures  instructed 
their  business  agents  in  London  to  protest. 

1  This  is  one  of  the  things  complained  of  in  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence.  A 


LIBERTY,    PROPERTY,    AND   NO   STAMPS" 


113 


This  the  agents  did  in  February,  1765.  But  Grenville,  the 
Prime  Minister,  was  not  to  be  persuaded,  and  on  March  22, 
1765,  Parliament  passed  the  Stamp  Act.1 

110.  The  Stamp  Distributors.  —  That  the  collection  of  the 
new  duty  might  give  as  little  offense  to  the  colonists  as  pos 
sible,  Grenville  desired  that  the  stamps  and  the  stamped 
paper  should  be  sold  by  Americans,  and  invited  the  agents 
of  the  colonies  to  name  men  to  be  "stamp  distributors"  in 
their  colonies.  The  law  was  to  go  into  effect  on  the  1st  of 
November,  1765.  After  that  day  every  piece  of  vellum,  every 
piece  of  paper,  on  which  was  written  any  legal  document  for 
use  in  any  court,  was  to  be  charged  with  a  stamp  duty  of  from 
three  pence  to  ten  pounds  sterling.  After  that  day,  every 
license,  bond,  deed,  warrant,  bill  of  lading,  indenture,  every 
pamphlet,  almanac,  newspaper,  pack  of  cards,  must  be  written 
or  printed  on  stamped  paper  to  be  made  in  England  and  sold 
at  prices  fixed  by  law.  If  any  dispute  arose  under  the  law,  the 
case  might  be  tried  in  the  vice-admiralty  courts  without  a  jury.2 

1  The  exact  text  of  the  Stamp  Act  has  been  reprinted  in  American  His 
tory  Leaflets,  No.  21.  For  an  excellent  account  of  the  causes  and  conse 
quences  of  the  Stamp  Act,  read  Lecky's  England  in  the  Eighteenth  Cen 
tury,  Vol.  III.,  Chap.  12 ;  Frothingham's  Eise  of  the  Republic  of  the 
United  States,  Chap.  5;  Channing's  The  United  States  of  America, 
1765-1865,  pp.  41-50. 


Stamps  used  in  1765 

2  The  stamps  were  not  the  adhesive  kind  we  are  now  accustomed  to 
fasten  on  letters.  Those  used  for  newspapers  and  pamphlets  and  printed 
documents  consisted  of  a  crown  surmounting  a  circle  in  which  were  the 
words,  "One  Penny  Sheet"  or  "Nine  Pence  per  Quire,"  and  were 


114  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

The  money  raised  by  this  tax  was  not  to  be  taken  to  England, 
but  was  to  be  spent  in  America  for  the  defense  of  the  colonies. 
Nevertheless,  the  colonists  were  determined  that  none  should 
be  raised.  The  question  was  not,  Shall  America  support  an 
army  ?  but,  Shall  Parliament  tax  America  ? 

111.  The  Virginia  Resolutions.  —  In  opposition  to  this,  Vir 
ginia  now  led  the  way  with  a  set  of  resolutions.  In  the 
House  of  Burgesses,  as  the  popular  branch  of  her  legislature 
was  called,  was  Patrick  Henry,  the  greatest  orator  in  the  colo 
nies.  By  dint  of  his  fiery  words,  he  forced  through  a  set  of 
resolutions  setting  forth 

1.  That  the  first  settlers  in  Virginia  brought  with  them  "all 

the  privileges  and  immunities  that  have  at  any  time  been 
held  "  by  "  the  people  of  Great  Britain." 

2.  That  their  descendants  held  these  rights. 

3.  That  by  two  royal  charters  the  people  of  Virginia  had  been 

declared  entitled  to  all  the  rights  of  Englishmen  "born 
within  the  realm  of  England." 

4.  That  one  of  these  rights  was  that  of  being  taxed  "  by  their 

own  Assembly." 

5.  That  they  were  not  bound  to  obey  any  law  taxing  them 

without  consent  of  their  Assembly.1 

Massachusetts  followed  with  a  call  for  a  congress  to  meet 
at  New  York  city. 

stamped  on  each  sheet  in  red  ink  by  a  hand  stamp  not  unlike  those  used 
at  the  present  day  to  cancel  stamps  on  letters.  Others,  used  on  vellum 
and  parchment,  consisted  of  a  square  piece  of  blue  paper,  glued  on  the 
parchment,  and  fastened  by  a  little  piece  of  brass.  A  design  was  then 
impressed  on  the  blue  paper  by  means  of  a  little  machine  like  that  used 
by  magistrates  and  notaries  public  to  impress  their  seals  on  legal  docu 
ments..  When  this  was  done,  the  parchment  was  turned  over,  and  a  little 
piece  of  white  paper  was  pasted  on  the  back  of  the  stamp.  On  this  white 
piece  was  engraved,  in  black,  the  design  shown  in  the  second  picture 
on  p.  113,  the  monogram  "  G.  R."  meaning  Georgius  Rex,  or  King 
George. 

1  These  resolutions,  printed  in  full  from  Henry's  manuscript  copy, 
are  in  Charming' s  The  United  States  of  America,  1765-1865,  pp.  51, 
52.  They  were  passed  May  29,  1765. 


"LIBERTY,   PROPERTY,    AND   NO    STAMPS"        .    11.5 

112.  Stamp-act  Congress.  — To  the  congress  thus  called  came 
delegates  from  all  the  colonies  except  New  Hampshire,  Virginia, 
North  Carolina,  and  Georgia.     The  session  began  at  New  York, 
on  the  5th  of  October,  1765;   and  after  sitting  in  secret  for 
twenty  days,  the  delegates  from  six  of  the  nine  colonies  present 
(Massachusetts,  New  York,  Rhode  Island,  Pennsylvania,  Dela 
ware,  and  Maryland)    signed  a  "Declaration  of  Eights  and 
Grievances. Jfl 

113.  Declaration  of  Rights.  —  The  ground  taken  in  the  decla- 
ration  was 

1.  That  the  Americans  were  subjects  of  the  British  crown. 

2.  That  it  was  the  natural  right  of  a  British  subject  to  pay  no 

taxes  unless  he  had  a  voice  in  laying  them. 

3.  That  the  Americans  were  not  represented  in  Parliament. 

4.  That  Parliament,  therefore,  could  not  tax  them,  and  that 

an  attempt  to  do  so   was   an   attack  on  the  rights   of 
Englishmen  and  the  liberty  of  self-government. 

114.  Grievances.  —  The    grievances    complained    of    were  : 
1.    Taxation   without   representation.     2.    Trial   without   jury 
(in  the  vice-admiralty  courts).      3.   The  Sugar  Act.      4.    The 
Stamp  Act.     5.    Restrictions  on  trade. 

115.  The  English  View  of  Representation.  —  Vvre,  in  this  coun 
try,  do  not  consider  a  person  represented  in  a  legislature  unless 
he  can  cast  a  vote  for  a  member  of  that  legislature.     In  Great 
Britain,  not  individuals  but  classes  were  represented.     Thus, 
the  clergy  were  represented  by  the  bishops  who  sat  in  the 
House  of  Lords ;  the  nobility,  by  the  nobles  who  had  seats  in 
the  House  of  Lords ;    and  the  mass  of  the  people,  the  com 
mons,  by  the  members  of  the  House  of  Commons.     At  that 
time,  very  few  Englishmen  could  vote  for  a  member  of  the 
House  of  Commons.     Great  cities  like  Liverpool,  Leeds,  Man 
chester,  did  not  send  even  one  member.     When  the  colonists 
held  that  they  were  not  represented  in  Parliament  because 

1  This  declaration  is  printed  in  full  in  Preston's  Documents  Illustrative 
of  American  History,  pp.  188-191. 


116  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

they  did  not  elect  any  members  of  that  body,  Englishmen 
answered  that  they  were  represented,  because  they  were 
commoners. 

116.  Sons  of  Liberty.  —  Meantime,  the  colonists  had  not  been 
idle.     Taking  the  name  of  "  Sons  of  Liberty,"  a  name  given  to 
them  in  a  speech  by  a  member  of  Parliament  (named  Barre) 
friendly  to  their  cause,  they  began  to  associate  for  resistance 
to  the  Stamp  Act.     At  first,  they  were  content  to  demand  that 
the  stamp  distributors  named  by  the  colonial  agents  in  London 
should  resign.      But  when  -these  officers  refused,  the  people 
became  violent ;   and  at   Boston,  Newark,  X. J.,  New  Haven, 
New  London,  Conn.,  at  Providence,  at  Newport,  R.I.,  at  Dover, 
N.H.,  at  Annapolis,  Md.,  serious  riots  took  place.     Buildings 
were  torn  down,  and  more  than  one  unhappy  distributor  was 
dragged  from  his  home,  and  forced  to  stand  before  the  people 
and  shout,  "  Liberty,  property,  and  no  stamps." 

117.  November  i,  1765. — As  the  1st  of  November,  the  day 
on  which  the  Stamp  Act  was  to  go  into  force,  approached, 
the  newspapers  appeared  decorated  with  death's-heads,  black 
borders,  coffins,  and  obituary  notices.     The  Pennsylvania  Jour 
nal   dropped   its   usual   heading,  and  in.   place  of  it   put  an 
arch  with  a  skull  and  crossbones  underneath,  and  this  motto, 
"  Expiring  in  the  hopes  of  a  resurrection  to  life  again."    In  one 
corner  was  a  coffin,  and  the  words,  "  The  last  remains  of  the 
Pennsylvania  Journal,  which  departed  this  life  the  31st  of 
October,  1765,  of  a  stamp  in  her  vitals.     Aged  23  years."     The 
Pennsylvania  Gazette,  on  November  7,  the  day  of  its  first  issue 
after  the  Stamp  Act  became  law,  published  a  half  sheet,  printed 
on  one  side,  without  any  heading,  and  in  its  place  the  words, 
"  No  stamped  paper  to  be  had."     During  the  next  six  months, 
every  scrap  of  stamped  paper  that  was  heard  of  was  hunted 
up  and  given  to  the  flames.     Thus,  when  a  vessel  from  Bar 
bados,  with  a  stamped  newspaper   published  on  that  island, 
reached  Philadelphia,  the  paper  was  seized  and  burned,  one 
evening,  at  the  coffeehouse,  in  the  presence  of  a  great  crowd. 
A  yessel  having  put  in  from   Halifax,  a  rumor  spread  that 


"LIBERTY,   PROPERTY,   AND   NO   STAMPS"  117 

the  captain  had  brought  stamped  paper  with  him,  and  was 
going  to  use  it  for  his  Philadelphia  clearance.  This  so  enraged 
the  people  that  the  vessel  was  searched,  and  a  sheet  of  paper 
with  three  stamps  on  it  was  found,  and  burned  at  the  coffee 
house. 

118.  Non-importation  Agreements.  —  Meantime,  the  merchants 
in  the  larger  towns,  and  the  people  all  over  the  country,  had 
been  making  written  agreements  not  to  import  any  goods  from 
England  for  some  months  to  come. 

The  effect  of  this  measure  was  immense.  Not  a  merchant 
nor  a  manufacturer  in  Great  Britain,  engaged  in  the  colonial 
trade,  but  found  his  American  orders  canceled  and  his  goods 
left  on  his  hands.  Not  a  ship  returned  from  this  country  but 
carried  back  English  wares  which  it  had  brought  here  to  sell, 
but  for  which  no  purchaser  could  be  found. 

119.  Stamp  Act  repealed.  —  When  Parliament  met  in  Decem 
ber,  1765,  such  a  cry  of  distress  came  up  from  the  manufactur 
ing  cities  of  England,  that  Parliament  was  forced  to  yield,  and 
in  March,  1766,  the  Stamp  Act  was  repealed.      In  the  out 
burst  of  joy  which  followed  in  America,  the  intent  and  mean 
ing  of  another  act  passed  at  the  same  time  was  little  heeded. 
In  it  was  the  declaration  that  Parliament  did  have  the  right 
to  tax  the  colonies  "  in  all  cases  whatsoever." 

120.  The  Townshend  Acts.  —  If  the  people  thought  this  decla 
ration  had  no  meaning,  they  were  much  mistaken,  for  next  year 
(1767)  Parliament   passed  what   have  since  been  called  the 
Townshend  Acts.     There  were  three  of  them.     One  forbade    i 
the  legislature  of  New  York  to  pass  any  more  laws  till  it  had 
provided  the  royal  troops  in  the  city  with  beds,  candles,  fire, 
vinegar,  and  salt,  as  required  by  what  was  called  the  Mutiny 
Act.     The  second  established  at  Boston  a  Board  of  Commis-  \ 
sioners  of  the  Customs  to  enforce  the  laws  relating  to  trade. 
The  third  laid  taxes  on  glass,  red  and  white  lead,  painter's  3 
colors,  paper,  and  tea.     None  of  these  taxes  was  heavy.     But  " 
again  the  right  of  Parliament  to  tax  people  not  represented  in 

it  had  been  asserted,  and  again  the  colonists  rose  in  resistance. 


118  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

The  legislature  of  Massachusetts  sent  a  letter  to  each  of  the 
other  colonial  legislatures,  urging  them  to  unite  and  consult 
for  the  protection  of  their  rights.  Pennsylvania  sent  protests 
to  the  King  and  to  Parliament.  The  merchants  all  over  the 
country  renewed  their  old  agreements  not  to  import  British 
goods,  and  many  a  shipload  was  sent  back  to  England. 

121.  Colonial  Legislatures  dissolved.1 — The  letter  of  Massa 
chusetts  to  the  colonial  legislatures  having  given  great,  offense 
to  the  King,  the  governors  were  ordered  to  see  to  it  that  the 
legislatures  did  not  approve  it.     But  the  order  came  too  late. 
Many  had  already  done  so,  and  as  a  punishment  the  assem 
blies  of  Maryland  and  Georgia  were  dismissed  and  the  mem 
bers  sent  home.     To  dissolve  assemblies  became  of  frequent 
occurrence.     The  legislature  of  Mas^cJiusetts  was  dissolved 
because  it  refused  to  recall  the  letter.     That  of  New  York  was 
repeatedly  dissolved  for  refusing  to  provide  the  royal  troops 
with  provisions.    That  of  Virginia  was  dismissed  for  complain 
ing  of  the  treatment  of  New  York. 

122.  Boston  Riot  of  1770. — And  now  the  troops  intended 
for  the  defense  of  the  colonies  began  to  arrive.     But  Massa 
chusetts,  North   Carolina,    and  South  Carolina  followed  the 
example  of  New  York,   and  refused  to  find  them    quarters. 
For   this   the   legislature   of  North   Carolina   was   dissolved. 
Everywhere  the  presence  of  the  soldiers  gave  great  offense; 
but  in  Boston  the  people  were  less  patient  than  elsewhere. 
They  accused  the  soldiers  of   corrupting   the   morals  of  the 
town;   of   desecrating   the   Sabbath   with  fife  and  drum;    of 
striking  citizens  who  insulted  them  ;  and  of  using  language 
violent,  threatening,  and  profane.     In  this  state  of  feeling,  an 
alarm  of  fire  called  the  people  into  the  streets  on  the  night  of 
March  5,  1770.     The  alarm  was  false,  and  a  crowd  of  men  and 
boys,  having  nothing  to  do,  amused  themselves  by  annoying 
a  sentinel  on  guard  at  one  of  the  public  buildings.     He  called 
for  help,  and  a  corporal  and  six  men  were  soon  on  the  scene. 

1  One  of  the  charges  against  the  King  in  the  Declaration  of  Independ- 


"LIBERTY,    PROPERTY,    AND   NO    STAMPS"  119 

But  the  crowd  would  not  give  way.  Forty  or  fifty  men  came 
armed  with  sticks  and  pressed  around  the  soldiers,  shouting, 
" Rascals!  Lobsters!  Bloody-backs  !"  throwing  snowballs  and 
occasionally  a  stone,  till  in  the  excitement  of  the  moment  a 
soldier  fired  his  gun.  The  rest  followed  his  example,  and 
when  the  reports  died  away,  five  of  the  rioters  lay  on  the 
ground  dead  or  dying,  and  six  more  dangerously  wounded.1 

This  riot,  this  "Boston  Massacre,"  or,  as  the  colonists  de 
lighted  to  call  it,  "  the  bloody  massacre,"  excited  and  aroused 
the  whole  land,  forced  the  government  to  remove  the  soldiers 
from  Boston  to  an  island  in  the  bay,  and  did  more  than  any 
thing  else  which  had  yet  happened,  to  help  on  the  Revolution. 
'  123.  Tea  sent  to  America  and  not  received.  —  While  these 
things  were  taking  place  in  America — indeed,  011  the  very  day 
of  the  Boston  riot  —  a  motion  was  made  in  Parliament  for  the 
repeal  of  all  the  taxes  laid  by  the  Townshend  Acts  except 
that  on  tea.  The  tea  tax  of  3d.  a  pound,  payable  in  the 
colonies,  was  retained  in  order  that  the  right  of  Parliament 
to  tax  America  might  be  vindicated.  But  the  people  held  fast 
to  their  agreements  not  to  consume  articles  taxed  by  Great 
Britain.  No  tea  was  drunk,  save  such  as  was  smuggled  from 
Holland,  and  at  the  end  of  three  years'  time  the  East  India 
Company  had  17,000,000  pounds  of  tea  stored  in  its  warehouses 
(1773).  This  was  because  the  company  was  not  permitted  to 
send  tea  out  of  England.  It  might  only  bring  tea  to  London 
and  there  sell  it  at  public  sale  to  merchants  and  shippers, 
who  exported  it  to  America.  But  now  when  the  merchants 
could  not  find  anybody  to  buy  tea  in  the  colonies,  they  bought 
less  from  the  company,  and  the  tea  lay  stored  in  its  ware 
houses.  To  relieve  the  company,  and  if  possible  tempt  the 
people  to  use  the  tea,  the  exportation  tax  was  taken  off  and 

1  The  soldiers  were  tried  for  murder  and  were  defended  by  John 
Adams  and  Josiah  Quincy.  Two  were  found  guilty  of  manslaughter. 
The  rest  were  acquitted.  On  the  massacre  read  Frothingham's  Life  oj 
Warren,  Chaps.  6,  7  ;  Kidder's  The  Boston  Massacre;  Joseph  Warren's 
Oration  on  March  6,  1775,  in  Library  of  American  Literature,  Vol.  III., 
p.  256. 


120  STRUGGLE   FOR  RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

the  company  was  given  leave  to  export  tea  to  America  con 
signed  to  commissioners  chosen  by  itself.  Taking  off  the 
shilling  a  pound  export  tax  in  England,  and  charging  but 
3d.  import  tax  in  America,  made  it  possible  for  the  company 
to  sell  tea  cheaper  than  could  the  merchants  who  smuggled  it. 
Yet  even  this  failed.  The  people  forced  the  tea  commission 
ers  to  resign  or  send  the  tea  ships  back  to  England.  In 
Charleston,  S.C.,  the  tea  was  landed  and  stored  for  three  years, 
when  it  was  sold  by  South  Carolina.  In  Philadelphia  the 
people  met,  and  having  voted  that  the  tea  should  not  be 
landed,  they  stopped  the  ship  as  it  came  up  the  Delaware,  and 
sent  it  back  to  London. 

124.  The  Boston  Tea  Party.  —  At  Boston  also  the  people  tried 
to  send  the  tea  ships  to  England,  but  the  authorities  would  not 
allow  them  to  leave,  whereupon  a  band  of  young  men  disguised 
as  Indians  boarded  the  vessels,  broke  open  the  boxes,  and  threw 
the  tea  into  the  water. 

125.  The  Five  Intolerable  Acts.  — When  Parliament  heard  of 
these  events,  it  at  once  determined  to  punish  Massachusetts, 
and  in  order  to  do  this  passed  five  laws  which  were  so  severe 
that  the  colonists  called  them  the  "Intolerable  Acts."     They 
are  generally  known  as 

1.  The  Boston  Port  Bill,  which  shut  the  port  of  Boston  to 

trade  and  commerce,  forbade  ships  to  come  in  or  go  out, 
and  moved  the  customhouse  to  Marblehead. 

2.  The  Transportation  Bill,  which  gave  the  governor  power  to 

send  anybody  accused  of  murder  in  resisting  the  laws, 
to  another  colony  or  to  England  for  trial. 

3.  The  Massachusetts  Bill,  which  changed  the  old  charter  of 

Massachusetts,  provided  for  a  military  governor,  and  for 
bade  the  people  to  hold  public  meetings  for  any  other 
purpose  than  the  election  of  town  officers,  without  per 
mission  from  the  governor. 

4.  The   Quartering   Act,   which   legalized  the   quartering   of 

troops  on  the  people, 


"LIBERTY,  PROPERTY,  AND  NO  STAMPS"     121 

5.  The  Quebec  Act,  which  enlarged  the  province  of  Quebec  (pp. 
Ill,  124)  to  include  all  the  territory  between  the  Great 
Lakes,  the  Ohio  River,  the  Mississippi  River,  and  Penn 
sylvania.  This  territory  was  claimed  by  Massachusetts, 
Connecticut,  and  Virginia  under  their  "sea  to  sea" 
charters  (pp.  33,  46,  52,  156). 

126.  A  Congress  called.  —  When  the  Virginia  legislature  in 
May,  1774,  heard  of  the  passage  of  the  Boston  Port  Bill,  it 
passed  a  resolution  that  the  day  on  which  the  law  went  into 
effect  in  Boston  should  be  a  day  of  "  fasting,  humiliation,  and 
prayer  "  in  Virginia.     For  this  the  governor  at  once  dissolved 
the  legislature.     But  the  members  met  and  instructed  a  com 
mittee  to  correspond  with  the  other  colonies  on  the  expediency 
of   holding  another  general  congress  of  delegates.     All  the 
colonies  approved,  and  New  York  requested  Massachusetts  to 
name  the  time  and  place  of  meeting.     This  she  did,  selecting 
Philadelphia  as  the  place,  and  September  1,  1774,  as  the  time. 

127.  The  First  Continental  Congress.  —  From  September  5  to 
October  26,  accordingly,  fifty-five  delegates,  representing  every 
colony  except  Georgia,  held  meetings  in  Carpenter's  Hall  at 
Philadelphia,  and  issued 

1.  An  address  to  the  people  of  the  colonies. 

2.  An  address  to  the  Canadians. 

3.  An  address  to  the  people  of  Great  Britain. 

4.  An  address  to  the  King. 

5.  A  declaration  of  rights. 

128.  The  Declaration  of  Rights.1  — In  this  declaration  the 
rights  of  the  colonists  were  asserted  to  be 

1.  Life,  liberty,  and  property. 

2.  To  tax  themselves. 

3.  To  assemble  peaceably  to  petition  for  the  redress  of  griev 

ances. 

1  Printed  in  Preston's  Documents,  pp.  192-198.  The  best  account  of 
the  coming  of  the  Revolution  is  Frothingham's  Else  of  the  Republic  of 
the  United  States,  Chaps.  5-11. 


122  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

4.  To   enjoy  the  rights  of  Englishmen  and  all  the  rights  granted 
by  the  colonial  charters. 

These  rights  it  was  declared  had  been  violated 

1.  By  taxing  the  people  without  their  consent. 

2.  By>  dissolving  assemblies. 

3.  By  quartering  troops  on  the  people  in  time  of  peace. 

4.  By  trying  men  without  a  jury. 

5.  By  passing  the  five  Intolerable  Acts. 

Before  the  Congress  adjourned  it  was  ordered  that  another 
Congress  should  meet  on  May  10,  1775,  in  order  to  take  action 
on  the  result  of  the  petition  to  the  King. 

SUMMARY 

1.  As  soon  as  Great  Britain  acquired  Canada  and  the  eastern  part  of  the 

Mississippi  valley  from  France,  and  Florida  from  Spain,  she  did 
three  things : 

A.  She  established  the  provinces  of  Quebec,  East  Florida,  West 
Florida,  and  the  Indian  country. 

B.  She  drew  a  line  round  the  sources  of  all  the  rivers  flowing 
into  the  Atlantic  from  the  west  and  northwest,  and  commanded  the 
colonial  governors  to  grant  no  land  and  to  allow  no  settlements  to 
be  made  west  of  this  line. 

C.  She  decided  to  send  a  standing  or  permanent  army  to  America 
to  take  possession  of  the  new  territory  and  defend  the  colonies. 

2.  A  part  of  the  cost  of  keeping  up  this  army  she  decided  to  meet  by  tax 

ing  the  colonists.     This  she  had  never  done  before. 

3.  The  chief  tax  was  the  stamp  duty  on  paper,  vellum,  etc.     This  the 

colonists  refused  to  pay,  and  Parliament  repealed  it. 

4.  The  colonists  having  denied  the  right  of  Parliament  to  tax  them,  that 

body  determined  to  establish  its  right  and  passed  the  "  Townshend 
Acts."  But  the  colonists  refused  to  buy  British  goods,  and  Parlia 
ment  repealed  all  the  Townshend  duties  except  that  on  tea. 

5.  As  the  Americans  would  not  order  tea  from  London,  the  East  India 

Company  was  allowed  to  send  it.  But  the  people  in  the  five  cities 
to  which  the  tea  was  sent  destroyed  it  or  sent  it  back. 

6.  Parliament  thereupon  attempted  to  punish  Massachusetts  and  passed 

the  Intolerable  Acts. 

7.  These  acts  led  to  the  calling  and  the  meeting  of  the  First  Continental 

Congress. 


"LIBERTY,  PROPERTY,   AND   NO   STAMPS" 


123 


ENGLAND  RECEIVES  (1763)  FROM 


France 

A 

Cape  Breton. 
Canada. 

Louisiana  east  of 
the  Mississippi. 


Spain 
Florida. 


and  cuts  the  new  territory  (1763)  into 

Province  of  Quebec, 

East  Florida, 

West  Florida, 

Indian  country, 
and  draws  proclamation  line 

limiting  colonies  in  the  west. 

New  colonial  policy  necessary. 


Country  to  be  defended  by  10,000  royal  troops. 
Cost  of  troops  to  be  paid  \ 


Partly  by  crown. 


Partly  by  colonies. 


Share  of  colonies  to  be  raised  by 
Enforcing  acts  of  trade  and  navigation. 
Taxes  on  sugar  and  molasses. 
Stamp  tax  (1765). 


Resisted. 

Action  of  Virginia  and  Massachusetts. 
Stamp  Act  Congress. 
Act  repealed  (1766). 
Declaratory  Act  (1766). 
{  Glass. 

Red  and  white  lead. 

Painters'  colors. 

Paper. 
I  Tea. 


Principle  involved. 


Townshend  Acts 
(1767). 


Resisted  and  repealed  (1770). 


Enforced. 
Resisted  (1773). 
Resistance 


punished  by 

J 


* 


-  \  Continental 


I     able  Acts.  I  Congress  called  (1774). 


Longitude 


86  West 


134 


BKITISH    COLONIES 

WHEN  INDEPENDENCE  WAS  DECLARED 

1776 


125 


CHAPTER  XI 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 

129.    When  the  10th  of  May,  1775,  came,  the  colonists  had 
ceased  to  petition  and  had  begun  to  fight.     In  accordance  with 

the  Massachusetts  Bill,  Gen 
eral  Thomas  Gage  had  been 
appointed  military  governor 
of  Massachusetts.  He  reached 
Boston  in  May,  1774,  and 
summoned  an  assembly  to 
meet  him  at  Salem  in  Octo 
ber.  But,  alarmed  at  the 
angry  state  of  the  people,  he 
fortified  Boston  Neck,  —  the 
only  land  approach  to  the  city, 
and  countermanded  the  meet 
ing.  The  members,  claiming 
that  an  assembly  could  not 
be  dismissed  before  it  met, 
gave  no  heed  to  the  procla 
mation,  but  gathered  at  Salem 
and  adjourned  to  Concord 
and  then  to  Cambridge.  At 
Cambridge  a  Committee  of 
Safety  was  chosen  and  given 
power  to  call  out  the  troops, 
and  steps  were  taken  to  col 
lect  ammunition  and  military  stores.  A  month  later  at  an 
other  meeting,  12,000  "  minute  men"  were  ordered  to  be 

126 


Statue  of  the  Minute  Man  at  Concord 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 


127 


enrolled.  These  minute  men  were  volunteers  pledged  to  be 
ready  for  service  at  a  minute's  notice,  and  lest  12,000  should 
not  be  enough,  the  neighboring  colonies  were  asked  to  raise 
the  number  to  20,000. 

130.  Concord  and  Lexington  —  Meantime  the  arming  and  drill 
ing  went  actively  on,  and  powder  was  procured,  and  magazines 
of  provisions  and  military  stores  were  collected  at  Concord,  at 


COUNTRY  AROUND 
BOSTON 


• 


Dedham  J 


Worcester,  at  Salem,  and  at  many  other  towns.  Aware  of  this, 
Gage,  on  the  night  of  April  18,  1775,  sent  off  800  regulars  to 
destroy  the  stores  at  Concord,  a  town  some  twenty  miles  from 
Boston.  Gage  wished  to  keep  this  expedition  secret,  but  he 
could  not.  The  fact  that  the  troops  were  to  march  became 
known  to  the  patriots  in  Boston,  who  determined  to  warn  the 
minute  men  in  the  neighborhood.  Messengers  were  accordingly 
stationed  at  Charlestown  and  told  to  ride  in  every  direction  and 
rouse  the  people,  the  moment  they  saw  lights  displayed  from 
the  tower  of  the  Old  North  Church  in  Boston.  The  instant 


128  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

the  British  began  to  inarch,  two  lights  were  hung  out  in  the 
tower,  and  the  messengers  sped  away  to  do  their  work.1 

The  road  taken  by  the  British  lay  through  the  little  village 
of  Lexington,  and  there  (so  well  had  the  messengers  done  their 
work),  about  sunrise,  on  the  morning  of  the  19th,  the  British 
came  suddenly  on  a  little  band  of  minute  men  drawn  up  on 
the  green  before  the  meeting  house.  A  call  to  disperse  was 
not  obeyed ;  whereupon  the  British  fired  a  volley,  killing  or 
wounding  sixteen  minute  men,  and  passed  on  to  Concord. 
There  they  spiked  three  cannon,  threw  some  cannon  balls  and 
powder  into  the  river,  destroyed  some  flour,  set  fire  to  the 
courthouse,  and  started  back  toward  Boston.  But  "  the  shot 
heard  round  the  world"  had  indeed  been  fired.2  The  news 
had  spread  far  and  wide.  The  minute  men  came  hurrying 
in,  and  from  farmhouses  and  hedges,  from  haystacks,  and 
from  behind  trees  and  stone  fences,  they  poured  a  deadly 
fire  on  the  retreating  British.  The  retreat  soon  became  a 
flight,  and  the  flight  would  have  ended  in  capture  had  they 
not  been  reenforced  by  900  men  at  Lexington.  With  the 
help  of  these  they  reached  Charlestown  Neck  by  sundown 
and  entered  Boston.3  All  night  long  minute  men  came  in 
from  every  quarter,  so  that  by  the  morning  of  April  20th 
great  crowds  were  gathered  outside  of  Charlestown  and  at 
Koxbury,  and  shut  the  British  in  Boston. 

When  the  news  of  Concord  and  Lexington  reached  the  Green 
Mountain  Boys  of  Vermont,  they  too  took  up  arms,  and,  under 
Ethan  Allen,  captured  Fort  Ticonderoga  on  May  10,  1775. 

131.  Congress  becomes  a  Governing  Body. — The  first  Con 
tinental  Congress  had  been  chosen  by  the  colonies  in  1774,  to 
set  forth  the  views  of  the  people,  and  remonstrate  against  the 
conduct  of  the  King  and  Parliament.  This  Congress,  it  will 

1  The  ride  of  one  of  these  men,  that  of  Paul  Revere,  has  become  best 
known  because  of  Longfellow's  poem,  Paul  Revere's  Ride.     Read  it. 

2  Read  R.  W.  Emerson's  fine  poem,  Concord  Hymn. 

3  Force's  American  Archives,  Vol.  II. ;  Hudson's  History  of  Lexing 
ton,  Chaps.  0,  7  ;  Phinney's  Battle  of  Lexington  ;  Shattuck's  History  of 
Voncord,  Chap.  7. 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   INDEPENDENCE  129 

be  remembered,  having  done  so,  fixed  May  10,  1775,  as  the 
day  whereon  a  second  Congress  should  meet  to  consider  the 
results  of  their  remonstrance.  But  when  the  day  came,  Lexing 
ton  and  Concord  had  been  fought,  all  New  England  was  in  arms, 
and  Congress  was  asked  to  adopt  the  army  gathered  around 
Boston,  and  assume  the  conduct  of  the  war.  Congress  thus  un 
expectedly  became  a  governing  body,  and  began  to  do  such 
things  as  each  colony  could  not  do  by  itself. 

132.  Origin  of  the  Continental  Army.  — After  a  month's  delay 
it  did  adopt  the  little  band  of  patriots  gathered  about  Boston, 
made  it  the  Continental  Army,  and  elected  George  Washing 
ton,  then  a  delegate  in  Congress,  commander  in  chief.     He  was 
chosen  because  of  the  military  sjjill  he  had  displayed  in  the 
French  and  Indian  War,  and  because  it  was  thought  necessary 
to  have  a  Virginian  for  general,  Virginia  being  then  the  most 
populous  of  the  colonies. 

Washington  accepted  the  trust  on  June  16,  and  set  out  for 
Boston  on  June  21 ;  but  he  had  not  ridden  twenty  miles  from 
Philadelphia  when  he  was  met  by  the  news  of  Bunker  Hill. 

133.  Bunker  Hill,  June  17,  1775.  —  On  a  narrow  peninsula  to 
the  north  of  Boston,  and  separated  from  it  by  a  sheet  of  water 
half  a  mile  wide,  was  the  village  of  Charlestown;  behind  it  were 
two  small  hills.     The  nearer  of  the  two  to  Charlestown  was 
Breeds  Hill.     Just  beyond  it  was   Bunker  Hill,  and  as  the 
two  overlooked  Boston  and  the  harbor  where  the  British  ships 
lay  at  anchor,  the  possession  of  them  was  of  much  importance. 
The  Americans,  learning  of  Gage's  intention  to  fortify  the 
hills,  sent  a  force  of  1200  men,  under  Colonel  Prescott,  on  the 
night  of  June  16,  to  take  possession  of  Bunker  Hill.     By 
some  mistake  Prescott  passed  Bunker  Hill,  reached  Breeds 
Hill,  and  before  dawn  had  thrown  up  a  large  earthwork.     The 
moment  daylight  enabled  it  to  be  seen,  the  British  opened  fire 
from  their  ships.     But  the  Americans  worked  steadily  on  in 
spite  of  cannon  shot,  and  by  noon  had  constructed  a  line  of 
intrenchments  extending  from  the  earthwork  down  the  hill 
toward  the  water.     Gage  might  easily  have  landed  men  and 

McM.  HIST. —8 


130 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 


taken  this  intrenchment  in  the  rear.  He  instead  sent  Howe l 
and  2500  men  over  in  boats  from  Boston,  to  land  at  the  foot 
of  the  hill  and  charge  straight  up  its  steep  side  toward  the 
Americans  on  its  summit.  The  Americans  were  bidden  not  to 
fire  till  they  saw  the  whites  of  the  enemy's  eyes,  and  obeyed. 
Not  a  shot  came  from  their  line  till  the  British  were  within  a 
few  feet.  Then  a  sheet  of  flames  ran  along  the  breastworks, 
and  when  the  smoke  blew  away,  the  British  were  running 
down  the  hill  in  confusion.  With  great  effort  the  officers  ral 
lied  their  men  and  led  them  up  the  hill  a  second  time,  to  be 

again  driven  back  to 
the  landing  place. 
This  fire  exhausted 
the  powder  of  the 
Americans,  and  when 
the  British  troops 
were  brought  up  for 
the  third  attack,  the 
Americans  fell  back, 
fighting  desperately 
with  gunstocks  and 
stones.  The  results  of 
this  battle  were  two 
fold.  It  proved  to 

the  Americans  that  the  British  regulars  were  not  invincible,  and 
it  proved  to  the  British  that  the  American  militia  would  fight. 
134.  Washington  takes  Command. — Two  weeks  after  this 
battle  Washington  reached  the  army,  and  on  July  3,  1775, 
took  command  beneath  an  elm  still  standing  in  Cambridge. 
Never  was  an  army  in  so  sorry  a  plight.  There  was  no 
discipline,  and  not  much  more  than  a  third  as  many  men  as 
there  had  been  a  few  weeks  before.  But  the  indomitable  will 
and  sublime  patience  of  Washington  triumphed  over  all  diffi 
culties,  and  for  eight  months  he  kept  the  British  shut  up  in 

1  General  William  Howe  had  come  to  Boston  with  more  British  troops 
not  long  before.     In  October,  1775,  he  was  given  chief  command. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 


131 


Boston,  while  he  trained  and  disciplined  his  army,  and  gath 
ered  ammunition  and  supplies. 

135.  Montreal   taken.  —  Meanwhile    Congress,    fearing   that 
Sir  Guy  Carleton,  who  was  governor  of  Canada,  would  invade 
New  York  by  way  of  Lake  Champlain,  sent  two  expeditions 
against  him.     One,  under  Richard  Montgomery,  went  down 
Lake   Champlain,  and  captured    Montreal.1      Another,  under 
Benedict  Arnold,  forced  its  way  through  the  dense  woods  of 
Maine,  and  after  dreadful  sufferings  reached  Quebec.     There 
Montgomery  joined  Arnold,  and  on  the  night  of  December  31, 

1775,  the  two   armies   assaulted   Quebec,  the   most   strongly 
fortified  city  in  America,  and  actually  entered  it.     But  Mont 
gomery  was  killed,  Arnold  was 

wounded,  the  attack  failed,  and, 
six  months  later,  the  Americans 
were  driven  from  Canada. 

136.  The  British    driven  from 
Boston,  March  17,  1776. — After 
eight  months  of    seeming    idle 
ness,  Washington,  early  in  March, 

1776,  seized  Dorchester  Height3 
on  the  south  side  of  Boston,  for* 
tified  them,  and  so  gave  Howe 
his  choice  of  righting  or  retreat 
ing.    Fight  he  could  not;  for  the 
troops,  remembering  the  dreadful 
day  at  Bunker  Hill,  were  afraid 
to  attack  intrenched  Americans. 
Howe  thereupon  evacuated  Bos 
ton  and  sailed  with  his  army  for  Halifax,  March  17,  1776. 
Washington  felt  sure  that  the  British  would  next  attack  New 
York,  so  he  moved  his  army  there  in  April,  1776,  and  placed  it 
on  the  Brooklyn  hills. 

137.  Independence   resolved   on.  —  Just   one   year   had   now 
passed  since  the  memorable  fights  at  Concord  and  Lexington. 

1  For  map,  see  p.  133. 


Bunker  Hill  Monument 


132 


STRUGGLE  FOR  RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 


During  this  year  the  colonies  had  been  solemnly  protesting 
that  they  had  no  thought  of  independence  and  desired  nothing 
so  much  as  reconciliation  with  the  King.  But  the  King  mean 
time  had  done  things  which  prevented  any  reconciliation: 

.1.    He  had  issued  a  proclamation  declaring  the  Americans  to 
be  rebels. 

2.  He  had  closed  their  ports  and  warned  foreign  nations  not 

to  trade  with  them. 

3.  He   had   hired   17,000   Hessians1   with  whom   to  subdue 

them. 

These  things  made  further  obedience  to  the  King  impossible, 
and  May  15,  1776,  Congress  resolved  that  it  was  "  necessary 
to  suppress  every  kind  of  authority  under  the  crown,"  and 
asked  the  colonies  to  form  governments  of  their  own  and  so 
become  states. 

On  the  7th  of  June,  Richard  Henry  Lee,  acting  under  in 
structions  from  Virginia,  offered  this  resolution: 


Prompt  action  in  so  serious  a  matter  was  not  to  be  expected, 
and  Congress  put  it  off  till  July  1.  Meanwhile  Thomas  Jef 
ferson,  Benjamin  Franklin,  John  Adams,  Roger  Sherman,  and 
Robert  R.  Livingston  were  appointed  to  write  a  declaration 
of  independence  and  have  it  ready  in  case  it  was  wanted.  As 
Jefferson  happened  to  be  the  chairman  of  the  committee,  the 

1  The  Hessians  were  soldiers  from  Hesse  and  other  small  German 
states. 


134 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 


duty  of  writing  the  declaration  was  given  to  him.  July  2, 
Congress  passed  Lee's  resolution,  and  what  had  been  the  United 
Colonies  became  free  and  independent  states. 

138.  Independence  declared.  —  Independence  having  thus 
been  decreed,  the  next  step  was  to  announce  the  fact  to  the 
world.  As  Jefferson  says  in  the  opening  of  his  declaration, 
"When,  in  the  course  of  human  events,  it  becomes  neces 
sary  for  one  people  to  dissolve  the  political  bands  which 


The  Pennsylvania  Statehouse,  or  Independence  Hall1 

have  connected  them  with  another  ...  a  decent  respect  to 
the  opinions  of  mankind  requires  that  they  should  declare 
the  causes  which  impel  them  to  the  separation."  It  was 
this  "decent  respect  to  the  opinions  of  mankind,"  there 
fore,  which  now  led  Congress,  on  July  4,  1776,  to  adopt  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  and  to  send  copies  to  the  states. 
Pennsylvania  got  her  copy  first,  and  at  noon  on  July  8  it  was 

i  From  the  Columbian  Magazine  of  July,  1787.  The  tower  faces  the 
"  Statehouse  yard."  The  posts  are  along  Chestnut  Street.  For  the  his 
tory  of  the  building,  read  F.  M.  Etting's  Independence  Hall 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   INDEPENDENCE  135 

read  to  a  vast  crowd  of  citizens  in  the  Statehouse  yard.1 
When  the  reading  was  finished,  the  people  went  off  to  pull 
down  the  royal  arms  in  the 
court  room,  while  the  great 
bell  in  the  tower,  the  bell 
which  had  been  cast  twenty- 
four  years  before  with  the 
prophetic  words  upon  its  side, 
"  Proclaim  liberty  through 
out  the  land  unto  all  the  in 
habitants  thereof,"  rang  out 
a  joyful  peal,  for  then  were 

announced  to  the  world  the  new  political  truths,  "that  all 
men  are  created  equal,"  and  "that  they  are  endowed  by  their 
Creator  with  certain  inalienable  rights,"  and  "that  among 
these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness." 
-i  139.  The  Retreat  up  the  Hudson.  —  A  few  days  later  the 
Declaration  was  read  to  the  army  at  New  York.  The  wisdom 
of  Washington  in  going  to  New  York  was  soon  manifest,  for 
in  July  General  Howe,  with  a  British  army  of  25,000  men, 
encamped  on  Staten  Island.  In  August  he  crossed  to  Long 
Island,  and  was  making  ready  to  besiege  the  army  on  Brooklyn 
Heights,  when,  one  dark  and  foggy  night,  Washington,  leaving 
his  camp  fires  burning,  crossed  with  his  army  to  New  York. 

Howe  followed,  drove  him  foot  by  foot  up  the  Hudson  from 
New  York  to  White  Plains;  carried  Fort  Washington,  on  the 
New  York  shore,  by  storm  (November  16,  1776) ;  and  sent  a 
force  across  the  Hudson  under  cover  of  darkness  and  storm  to 
capture  Fort  Lee.  But  the  British  were  detected  in  the  very 
nick  of  time,  and  the  Americans,  leaving  their  fires  burning 
and  their  tents  standing,  fled  towards  Newark,  N.  J. 

140.  The  Retreat  across  the  Jerseys.  —  Washington,  mean 
while,  had  gone  from  White  Plains  to  Hackensack  in  New 
Jersey,  leaving  7000  men  under  Charles  Lee  in  New  York  state 

1  The  declaration  was  read  from  a  wooden  platform  put  up  there  in 
1769  to  enable  David  Rittenhouse  to  observe  a  transit  of  Venus. 


136 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 


at  North  Castle.     These  men  he 
now  ordered  Lee  to  bring  over  to 
Hackensack,  but  the  jealous  and 
mutinous    Lee  refused   to   obey. 
This  forced  Washington  to  begin 
his  famous  retreat  across  the  Jer 
seys,  going  first  to  New 
ark,  then  to  New  Bruns 
wick,  then  to  Trenton, 
and  then  over  the  Dela 
ware  into  Pennsylvania, 
with  the  British 
under  Cornwallis 
in  hot  pursuit. 


141.  The  Surprise  at  Trenton.— Lee  crossed  the  Hudson  and 
went  to  Morristown,  where  a  just  punishment  for  his  disobe 
dience  speedily  overtook  him.  One  night  while  he  was  at  an 
inn  outside  of  his  lines,  some  British  dragoons  made  him  a 
prisoner  of  war.  The  capture  of  Lee  left  Sullivan  in  com 
mand,  and  by  him  the  troops  were  hurried  off  to  join  Washing 
ton.  Thus  reenforced,  Washington  turned  on  the  enemy,  and 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE       137 

on  Christmas  night  in  a  blinding  snowstorm  he  recrossed  the 
Delaware,  marched  nine  miles  to  Trenton,  surprised  a  force  of 
Hessians,  took  1000  prisoners,  and  went  back  to  Pennsylvania. 
The  effect  of  this  victory  was  tremendous.  At  first  the 
people  could  not  believe  it,  and,  to  convince  them,  the  Hessians 
had  to  be  marched  through  the  streets  of  Philadelphia,  and 
one  of  their  flags  was  sent  to  Baltimore  (whither  Congress  had 
fled  from  Philadelphia),  and  hung  up  in  the  hall  of  Congress. 
When  the  people  were  convinced  of  the  truth  of  the  report, 
their  joy  was  unbounded;  militia  was  hurried  forward,  the 
Jerseymen  gathered  at  Morristown,  money  was  raised;  the 
New  England  troops,  whose  time  of  service  was  out,  were  per 
suaded  to  stay  six  weeks  longer,  and,  December  30,  1776, 
Washington  again  entered  Trenton. 

Meantime  Cornwallis,  who  had  heard  of  the  capture  of  the 
Hessians,  came  thundering  down  from  New  Brunswick  with 
8000  men  and  hemmed  in  the  Americans  between  his  army 
and  the  Delaware.  But  on  the  night  of  January  2,  1777, 
Washington  slipped  away,  passed  around  Cornwallis,  hurried 
to  Princeton,  and  there,  on  the  morning  of  January  3,  put  to 
rout  three  regiments  of  British  regulars.  Cornwallis,  who  was 
not  aware  that  the  Americans  had  left  his  front  till  he  heard 
the  firing  in  his  rear,  fell  back  to  New  Brunswick,  while 
Washington  marched  unmolested  to  Morristown,  where  he 
spent  the  rest  of  the  winter. 

142.  The  Capture  of  Philadelphia." — Late  in  May,  1777, 
Washington  entered  New  York  state.  But  Howe  paid  little 
attention  to  this  movement,  for  he  had  fully  determined  to 
attack  and  capture  Philadelphia,  and  on  July  23  set  sail 
from  New  York.  As  the  fleet  moved  southward,  its  progress 
was  marked  by  signal  fires  along  the  Jersey  coast,  and  the 
news  of  its  position  was  carried  inland  by  messengers.  At 
the  end  of  a  week  the  fleet  was  off  the  entrance  of  Delaware 
Bay.  But  Lord  Howe  fearing  to  sail  up  the  river,  the  fleet 
went  to  sea  and  was  lost  to  sight.  Washington,  who  had 
hurried  southward  to  Philadelphia,  was  now  at  a  loss  what  to 


138 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 


THE  BATTLES 

AROUND 

PHILADELPHIA 


do,  and  was  just  about  to  go  back  to  New  York  when  he  heard 
that  the  British  were  coming  up  Chesapeake  Bay,  and  at  once 
marched  to  Wilmington,  Del. 

It  was  the  25th  of  August  that  Howe  landed  his  men  and 
began  moving  toward  Washington,  who,  lest  the  British  should 
push  by  him,  fell  back  from  Wilmington,  to  a  place  called 
Chadds  Ford  on  the  Brandy  wine,  where,  on  September  11, 1777, 
a  battle  was  fought.1  The  Americans  were  defeated  and  re 
treated  in  good  order  to  Chester,  and  the  next  day  Washington 
entered  Philadelphia.  But  public  opinion  demanded  that 
another  battle  should  be  fought  before  the  city  was  given  up, 
and  after  a  few  days  he  recrossed  the  Schuylkill,  and  again 
faced  the  enemy.  A  violent  storm  ruined  the  ammunition  of 
both  armies  and  prevented  a  battle,  and  the  Americans  re 
treated  across  the  Schuylkill  at  a  point  farther  up  the  stream. 

1  Among  the  wounded  in  this  battle  was  a  brilliant  young  Frenchman, 
the  Marquis  de  Lafayette,  who,  early  in  1777,  came  to  America  and 
offered  his  services  to  Congress  as  a  volunteer  without  pay. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 


139 


Congress,  which  had  returned  to  Philadelphia  from  Balti 
more,  now  fled  to  Lancaster  and  later  to  York,  Pa.,  and 
(September  26,  1777)  Howe  entered  Philadelphia  in  triumph. 
October  4,  Washington  attacked  him  at  Germantown,  but  was 
repulsed,  and  went  into 
winter  quarters  at  Valley 
Forge. 

143.  New  York  invaded. 
—  Though  Washington 
had  been  defeated  in  the 
battles  around  Philadel 
phia,  and  had  been  forced 
to  give  that  city  to  the 
British,  his  campaign 
made  it  possible  for  the 
Americans  to  win  another 
glorious  victory  in  the 
north.  At  the  beginning 
of  1777  the  British  had 
planned  to  conquer  New 
York  and  so  cut  the  East 
ern  States  off  from  the 
Middle  States.  To  accom 
plish  this,  a  great  army 
under  John  Burgoyne  was 
to  come  up  to  Albany  by 
way  of  Lake  Champlain. 
Another,  under  Colonel  St.  Leger,  was  to  go  up  the  St.  Law 
rence  and  Lake  Ontario  to  Oswego  and  come  down  the  Mohawk 
valley  to  Albany ;  while  the  third  army,  under  Howe,  was  to 
go  up  the  Hudson  from  New  York  and  meet  Burgoyne  at 
Albany.  True  to  this  plan,  Burgoyne  came  up  Lake  Cham- 
plain,  took  Ticonderoga  (July  5),  and,  driving  General  Schuy- 
ler  before  him,  reached  Fort  Edward  late  in  July.  There  he 
heard  that  the  Americans  ha<J  collected  some  supplies  at  Ben- 
nington,  a  little  village  in  the  southwestern  corner  of  Vermont, 


Peek-skill 


140 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 


whither  he  sent  1000  men.  But  Colonel  John  Stark  met  and 
utterly  destroyed  them  on  August  16.  Meanwhile  St.  Leger, 
as  planned,  had  landed  at  Oswego,  and 
on  August  3  laid  siege  to  Fort  Stan- 
wix,  which  then  stood  on  the  site  of 
the  present  city  of  Rome,  N.Y.  On 
the  6th  the  garrison  sallied  forth,  at 
tacked  a  part  of  St.  Leger's  camp,  and 
carried  off  five  British  flags.  These 
they  hoisted  upside  down  on  their  ram 
parts,  and  high  above  them  raised  a 
new  flag  which  Congress  had  adopted  in  June,  and  which  was 
then  .for  the  first  time  flung  to  the  breeze. 

144.  Our  National  Flag.  — It  was  our  national  flag,  the  stars 
and  stripes,  and  was  made  of  a  piece  of  a  blue  jacket,  some 
strips  of  a  white  shirt,  and  some  scraps  of  old  red  flannel.1 


Flag:  of  the  East  India 
Company 


1  The  flags  used  by  the  continental  troops  between  1775  and  1777  were 
of  at  least  a  dozen  different  patterns.  A  colored  plate  showing  most  of 
them  is  given  in  Treble's  Our  Flag,  p.  142.  In 
1776,  in  January,  Washington  used  one  at  Cam 
bridge  which  seems  to  have  been  suggested  by  the 
ensign  of  the  East  India  Company.  That  of  this 
company  was  a  combi 
nation  of  thirteen  hori 
zontal  red  and  white 
stripes  (seven  red  and 
six  white)  and  the  red 
cross  of  St.  George.  That 
of  Washington  was  the 
same,  with  the  British 
Union  Jack  substituted 
for  the  cross  of  St. 
George.  After  the  Dec 
laration  of  Independence,  the  British  Jack  was  out  of  place  on  our  flag ; 
and  in  June,  1777,  Congress  adopted  a  union  of  thirteen  white  stars  in  a 
circle,  on  a  blue  ground,  in  place  of  the  British  Union. 

After  Vermont  and  Kentucky  were  admitted,  in  1791  and  1792,  the 
stars  and  stripes  were  each  increased  to  fifteen.  In  1818,  the  original 
number  of  stripes  was  restored,  and  since  that  time  each  new  state, 
when  admitted,  is  represented  by  a  star  and  not  by  a  stripe. 


Flag  of  the 
United  Colonies 


British  Union  Jack 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR   INDEPENDENCE  141 

145.  Capture  of  Burgoyne.  —  When  Schuyler  heard  of  the 
siege  of  Fort  Stanwix,  he  sent  Benedict  Arnold  to  relieve  it, 
and  St.  Leger  fled  to  Oswego.     Then  was  the  time  for  the  expe 
dition  from  New  York  to  have  hurried  to  Burgoyne's  aid.    But 
Howe  and  his  army  were  then  at  sea.     No  help  was  given  to 
Burgoyne,  who,  after  suffering  defeats  at  Bemis  Heights  (Sep 
tember  19)  and  at  Stillwater  (October  7),  retreated  to  Saratoga, 
where  (October  17,  1777)  he  surrendered  his  army  of  6000  men 
to  General  Horatio  Gates,  whom  Congress,  to  its  shame,  had 
just  put  in  the  place  of  Schuyler.     Gates  deserves  no  credit  for 
the  capture.    Arnold  and  Daniel  Morgan  deserve  it,  and  deserve 
much ;  for,  judged  by  its  results,  Saratoga  was  one  of 

the  great  battles  of  the  world.     The  results  of  the  sur 
render  were  four  fold : 

1.  It  saved  New  York  state. 

2.  It  destroyed  the  plan  for  the  war. 

3.  It  induced  the  King  to  offer  us  peace  with 

representation  in  Parliament,  or  any 
thing  else  we  wanted  except  independ 
ence 

Flag  of  the  United 

4.  It  secured  for  us  the  aid  of  France.  states,  1777 

146.  Valley  Forge.  —  The  winter  at  Valley  Forge  marks  the 
darkest  period  of  the  war.     It  was  a  season  of  discourage 
ment,  when  mean  spirits  grew  bold.     Some   officers   of  the 
army  formed  a  plot,  called  from  one  of  them  the  "Conway 
cabal,"  to  displace  Washington  and  put  Gates  in   command. 
The  country  people,  tempted  by  British  gold,  sent  their  pro 
visions  into  Philadelphia  and  not  to  Valley  Forge.    There  the 
suffering  of  the  half-clad,  half-fed,  ill-housed  patriots  surpasses 
description. 

But  the  darkest  hour  is  just  before  the  dawn.  Then  it  was 
that  an  able  Prussian  soldier,  Baron  Steuben,  joined  the  army, 
turned  the  camp  into  a  school,  drilled  the  soldiers,  and  made 
the  army  better  than  ever.  Then  it  was  that  France  acknowl 
edged  our  independence,  and  joined  us  in  the  war. 


142  STRUGGLE  FOR   RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 

147.  France   acknowledges   our   Independence.  —  In    October, 
1776,  Congress  sent  Benjamin  Franklin  to  Paris  to  try  to  per 
suade  the  French  King  to  help  us  in  the  war.     Till  Burgoyne 
surrendered  and  Great  Britain  offered  peace,  Franklin  found 
all  his  efforts  vain.1     But  now,  when  it  seemed  likely  that  the 
states  might  again  be  brought  under  the  British  crown,  the 
French  King  promptly  acknowledged  us  to  be  an  independent 
nation,  made  a  treaty  of  alliance  and  a  treaty  of  commerce 
(February  6, 1778),  and  soon  had  a  fleet  on  its  way  to  help  us. 

148.  The  British  leave  Philadelphia. — Hearing   of    the   ap 
proach  of  the  French  fleet,  Sir  Henry  Clinton,  who  in  May  had 
succeeded  Howe  in  command,  left  Philadelphia  and  hurried  to 
the  defense  of  New  York.     Washington  followed,  and,  coming 
up  with  the  rear  guard  of  the  enemy  at  Monmouth  in  New 
Jersey,  fought  a  battle  (June  28, 1778),  and  would  have  gained 
a  great  victory  had  not  the  traitor,  Charles  Lee,  been  in  com 
mand.2     Without  any  reason  he  suddenly  ordered  a  retreat, 
which  was  fortunately  prevented   from   becoming  a  rout  by 
Washington,  who  came  on  the  field  in  time  to  stop  it. 

After  the  battle  the  British  hurried  on  to  New  York,  where 
Washington  partially  surrounded  them  by  stretching  out  his 
army  from  Morristown  in  New  Jersey  to  West  Point  on  the 
Hudson.3 

149.  Stony  Point.  —  In  hope  of  drawing  Washington  away 
from  New  York,  Clinton  in  1779  sent  a  marauding  party  to 
plunder  and  ravage  the  farms  and  towns  of  Connecticut.     But 
Washington  soon   brought   it   back   by  dispatching  Anthony 
Wayne  to  capture  Stony  Point,  which  he  did  (July,  1779)  by 
one  of  the  most  brilliant  assaults  in  military  history. 

150.  Indian  Raids.  —  That  nothing  might  be  wanting  to  make 
the  suffering  of  the  patriots  as  severe  as  possible,  the  Indians 

1  For  an  account  of  Franklin  in  France,  see  McMaster's    With  the 
Fathers,  pp.  253-270. 

2  After  remaining  a  prisoner  in  the  hands  of  the  British  from  Decem 
ber,  1776,  to  April,  1778,  Lee  had  been  exchanged  for  a  British  officer. 

3  See  map  on  p.  136. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE       143 

were  let  loose.  Led  by  a  Tory l  named  Butler,  a  band  of  whites 
and  Indians  of  the  Seneca  tribe  of  the  Six  Nations 2  marched 
from  Fort  Niagara  to  Wyoming  Valley  in  northeastern  Penn 
sylvania,  and  there  perpetrated  one  of  the  most  awful  mas 
sacres  in  history.  Another  party,  led  by  a  son  of  Butler, 
repeated  the  horrors  of  Wyoming  in  Cherry  Valley,  N.Y. 

151.  George    Rogers    Clark.  —  Meantime    the    British    com 
mander  at  Detroit  tried  hard  to  stir  up  the  Indians  of  the  West 
to  attack  the  whole  frontier  at  the  same  moment.     Hearing  of 
this,  George  Rogers  Clark  of  Virginia  marched  into  the  enemy's 
country,  and  in  two  fine  campaigns  in   1778-1779   beat   the 
British,  and   conquered   the   country   from  the   Ohio  to   the 
Great  Lakes  and  from  Pennsylvania  to  the  Mississippi. 

152.  Sullivan's  Expedition.  —  In  1779  it  seemed  so  important 
to  punish  the  Indians  for  the  Wyoming  and  Cherry  Valley 
massacres  that  General  Sullivan  with  an  army  invaded  the  ter 
ritory  of  the  Six  Nations,    in  central  New  York,  burned  some 
forty  Indian  villages,  and  utterly  destroyed  the  Indian  power 
in  that  state. 

153.  The  South  invaded.  —  For  a  year  and  more  there  had 
been  a  lull  in  military  operations  on  the  part  of  the  British. 
But  they  now  began  an  attack  in  a   new   quarter.     Having 
failed  to  conquer  New  England  in  1775-1776,  having  failed  to 
conquer  the  Middle  States  in  1776-1777,  they  sent  an  expedition 
against  the  South  in  December,  1778.     Success  attended  it. 
Savannah  was  captured,  Georgia  was  conquered,  and  the  royal 
governor  reinstated.     Later,  in  1779,  General  Lincoln,  with  a 
French  fleet  to  help  him,  attempted  to  recapture  Savannah, 
but  was  driven  off  with  dreadful  loss  of  life. 

These  successes  in  Georgia  so  greatly  encouraged  the  Brit 
ish  that  in  the  spring  of  1780  Clinton  led  an  expedition 
against  South  Carolina,  and  (May  12)  easily  captured  Charles- 

1  Not  all  the  colonists  desired  independence.      Those  who  remained 
loyal  to  the  King  were  called  Tories. 

2  By  this  time  the  Five  Nations  had  admitted  the  Tuscaroras  to  their 
confederacy  and  had  thus  become  the  Six  Nations. 


144  STRUGGLE  FOR   RIGHTS  OF  ENGLISHMEN 

ton,  with  Lincoln  and  his  army.  By  dint  of  great  exertions 
another  army  was  quickly  raised  in  North  Carolina,  and  the 
command  given  to  Gates  by  Congress.  He  was  utterly  unfit 
for  it,  and  (August  16, 1780)  was  defeated  and  his  army  almost 
destroyed  at  Camden  by  Lord  Cornwallis.  .  Never  in  the  whole 
course  of  the  war  had  the  American  army  suffered  such  a 
crushing  defeat.  All  military  resistance  in  South  Carolina 
was  at  an  end,  save  such  as  was  offered  by  gallant  bands  of 
patriots  led  by  Marion,  Sumter,  and  Pickens. 

154.  The  Treason  of  Arnold.  —  The  outlook  was  now  dark 
enough;  but  it  was  made  darker  still  by  the   treachery  of 
Benedict  Arnold.     No  officer  in  the  Revolutionary  army  was 
more  trusted.     His  splendid  march  through  the  wilderness  to 
Quebec,  his  bravery  in  the  attack  on  that  city,  the  skill  and 
courage  he  displayed  at  Saratoga,  had  marked  him  out  as  a 
man  full  of  promise.     But  he  lacked  that  moral  courage  with 
out  which  great  abilities  count  for  nothing.     In  1778  he  was 
put  in  command  of  Philadelphia,  and  while  there  so  abused 
his  office  that  he  was  sentenced  to  be  reprimanded  by  Wash 
ington.     This  aroused  a  thirst  for  revenge,  and  led  him  to  form 
a  scheme  to  give  up  the  Hudson  River  to  the  enemy.     With 
this  end  in  view,  he  asked  Washington  in"  July,  1780,  for  the 
command  of  West  Point,  the  great  stronghold  on  the  Hudson, 
obtained  it,  and  at  once  made  arrangements  to  surrender  it 
to  Clinton.     The  British  agent  in  the  negotiation  was  Major 
John  Andre,  who  one  day   in   September   met   Arnold  near 
Stony  Point.     But  most  happily,  as  he  was  going  back  to  New 
York,  three  Americans 1  stopped  him  near  Tarrytown,  searched 
him,  and  in  his  stockings  found  some  papers  in  the  handwriting 
of  Arnold.     News  of  the  arrest  of  Andre  reached  Arnold  in 
time  to  enable  him  to  escape  to  the  British;  he  served  with 
them  till  the  end  of  the  war,  and   then  sought  a  refuge  m 
England.     Andre  was  tried  as  a  spy,  found  guilty,  and  hanged. 

155.  Victory    at    Kings    Mountain.  —  After    the    defeat    of 
Gates  at  Camden,  the  British  overran   South  Carolina,  and 

1  The  names  of  these  men  were  Paulding,  Williams,  and  Van  Wart. 


THE    STRUGGLE    FOK    INDEPENDENCE 


145 


CAMPAIGNS  IN  THE 

SOUTH 

1778-1781 


~o 

g| 


7T 

v   iH  I  111 


in  the  course  of 
their  marauding  a 
band   of   1100   Tories 
marched  to  Kings  Moun 
tain,  on  the  border  line 
between    the   two    Caro- 
linas.     There   the  hardy 
mountaineers       attacked 
them  (Oct.  7,  1780)  and 
killed,  wounded,  or  captured  the  entire  band. 

156.  Victory  at  the  Cowpens.  —  Meantime  a  third  army  was 
raised  for  use  in  the  South  and  placed  under  the  command  of 
McM.  HIST.— 9 


146  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

Nathanael  Greene,  than  whom  there  was  no  abler  general  in 
the  American  army.  With  Greene  was  Daniel  Morgan,  who 
had  distinguished  himself  at  Saratoga,  and  by  him  a  British 
force  under  Tarleton  was  attacked  January  17,  1781,  at  a 
place  called  the  Cowpens,  and  not  only  defeated,  but  almost 
destroyed. 

Enraged  at  these  reverses,  Cornwallis  took  the  field  and 
hurried  to  attack  Greene,  who,  too  weak  to  fight  him,  began 
a  masterly  retreat  of  200  miles  across  Carolina  to  Guilford 
Courthouse,  where  he  turned  about  and  fought.  He  was 
defeated,  but  Cornwallis  was  unable  to  go  further,  and  retreated 
to  Wilmington,  N.C.,  with  Greene  in  hot  pursuit.  Leaving 
the  enemy  at  Wilmington,  Greene  went  back  to  South  Caro 
lina,  and  by  September,  1781,  had  driven  the  British  into 
Charleston  and  Savannah. 

Cornwallis,  as  soon  as  Greene  left  him,  hurried  to  Peters 
burg,  Va.  A  British  force  during  the  winter  and  spring  had 
been  plundering  and  ravaging  in  Virginia,  under  the  traitor 
Arnold.  Cornwallis  took  command  of  this,  sent  Arnold  to 
New  York,  and  had  begun  a  campaign  against  Lafayette,  when 
orders  reached  him  to  seize  and  fortify  some  Virginian  seaport. 

157.  Surrender  of  Cornwallis.  —  Thus  instructed,  Cornwallis 
selected  Yorktown,  and  began  to  fortify  it  strongly.     This  was 
early  in  August,  1781.     On  the  14th  Washington  heard  with 
delight  that  a  French  fleet  was  on  its  way  to  the  Chesapeake, 
and  at  once  decided  to  hurry  to  Virginia,  and  surround  Corn 
wallis  by  land  while  the  French  cut  him  off  by  sea.     Prepara 
tions  were  made  with  such  secrecy  and  haste  that  Washington 
had  reached  Philadelphia  while  Clinton  supposed  he  was  about 
to  attack  New  York.     Clinton  then  sent  Arnold  on  a  raid  into 
Connecticut  to  burn  New  London,  in  the  hope  of  forcing  Wash 
ington  to  return.     But  Washington  kept  straight  on,  hemmed 
Cornwallis  in  by  land  and  sea,  and  October  19, 1781,  forced  the 
British  general  to  surrender. 

158.  The  War  OB  the  Sea.  —  The  first  step  towards  the  foun 
dation  of  an  American  navy  was  taken  on  October  13,  1775. 


THE   STRUGGLE    FOR    INDEPENDENCE  147 

Congress,  hearing  that  two  British  ships  laden  with  powder 
and  guns  were  011  their  way  from  England  to  Quebec,  ordered 
two  swift  sailing  vessels  to  be  fitted  out  for  the  purpose  of 
capturing  them.  But  it  was  not  till  British  cruisers  began  to 
seize  American  ships,  not  till  the  town  of  Falmouth,  now  Port 
land,  in  Maine,  had  been  laid  in  ashes,  and  the  people  of  other 
sea  towns  driven  from  their  homes,  that  a  serious  effort  was 
made  to  create  a  navy.  Then  (December  13,  1775)  Congress 
ordered  thirteen  cruisers  to  be  built,  and  named  the  officers  to 
command  them. 

Meantime  some  merchant  ships  were  purchased  and  collected 
at  Philadelphia,  from  which  city,  one  morning  in  January,  1776, 
a  fleet  of  eight  vessels  set  sail.  As  they  were  about  to  weigh 
anchor,  John  Paul  Jones,  a  lieutenant  on  the  flagship,  flung  to 
the  breeze  a  yellow  silk  flag  on  which  was  a  pine  tree  and  a 
coiled  rattlesnake,  with  this  motto :  "  Don't  tread  on  me."  This  \ 
was  the  first  flag  ever  hoisted  on  an  American  man-of-war. 

Ice  in  the  Delaware  kept  the  fleet  in  the  river  till  the  middle 
of  February,  when  it  went  to  sea,  sailed  southward  to  New 
Providence  in  the  Bahamas,  captured  the  town,  brought  off 
the  governor,  some  powder  and  cannon,  and  after  taking 
several  prizes  got  safely  back  to  New  London.  In  March, 
1776,  Congress  began  to  issue  letters  of  marque,  or  licenses  to 
citizens  to  engage  in  war  against  the  enemy  ;  and  then  the  sea 
fairly  swarmed  with  privateers  fitted  out  not  only  by  individu 
als,  but  by  the  states. 

In  1777  the  American  flag  was  seen  for  the  first  time  in 
European  waters,  when  a  little  squadron  of  three  uhips  set 
sail  from  Nantes  in  France,  and  after  cruising  on  the  Bay  of 
Biscay  went  twice  around  Ireland  and  came  back  to  France 
with  fifteen  prizes.  As  France  had  not  then  acknowledged 
our  independence,  they  were  ordered  to  depart.  Two  did  so ; 
but  one  of  them,  the  Lexhujton,  was  captured  by  the  British, 
and  the  other,  the  Reprisal,  was  wrecked  at  sea, 

159.  Paul  Jones.  —  Meanwhile  our  commissioners  in  France, 
Benjamin  Franklin  and  Silas  Deane,  fitted  out  a  cruiser  called 


148 


STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 


the  Surprise.  She  sailed  from  Dunkirk  on  May  1,  1777,  and 
the  next  week  was  back  with  a  British  packet  as  a  prize.  For 
this  violation  of  French  neutrality  she  was  seized.  But  another 
ship,  the  Revenge,  was  quickly  secured,  which  scoured  the  Brit 
ish  waters,  and  actually  entered  two  British  ports  before  she 
sailed  for  America.  The  exploits  of  these  and  a  score  of  other 
ships  are  cast  into  the  shade,  however,  by  the  fights  of  John 
Paul  Jones,  the  great  naval  hero  of  the  Eevolution.  He  sailed 
from  Portsmouth,  N.H.,  November  1,  1777,  refitted  his  ship  in 
the  harbor  of  Brest,  and  in  1778  began  one  of  the  most  memo 
rable  cruises  in  our  naval  history.  In  the  short  space  of 
twenty-eight  days  he  sailed  into  the  Irish  Channel,  destroyed 
four  vessels,  set  fire  to  the  shipping  in  the  port  of  Whitehaven, 
fought  and  captured  the  British  armed  schooner  Drake,  sailed 
around  Ireland  with  his  prize,  and  reached  France  in  safety. 

For  a  year  he  was  forced  to  be  idle.     But  at  last,  in  1779, 
he  was  given  command  of  a  squadron  of  five  vessels,  and  in 

August  sailed  from  France. 
Passing  along  the  west  coast 
of  Ireland,  the  fleet  went 
around  the  north  end  of  Scot 
land  and  down  the  east  coast, 
capturing  and  destroying  ves 
sel  after  vessel  on  the  way. 
When  off  a  place  called  Flam- 
borough  Head  (September  23, 
1779),  Jones  (in  his  ship, 
named  Bonhomme  Richard  in 
honor  of  Franklin's  famous 
Poor  Richard's  Almanac)  fell 
in  with  the  Serapis,  a  British 
frigate.  It  was  night  when 
the  ships  met ;  but  they  grappled,  and,  lashed  side  by  side  in 
the  moonlight,  they  fought  one  of  the  most  desperate  battles  in  1 
naval  annals.  At  the  end  of  three  hours  the  Serapis  surren 
dered,  but  the  Bonhomme  Richard  was  a  wreck,  and  next  morn- 


Benjamin  Franklin 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   INDEPENDENCE  149 


The  Mount  Vernon  house,  south  front 

ing,  giving  a  sudden  roll,  she  filled  and  plunged  bow  first  to  the 
bottom  of  the  North  Sea.     Jones  sailed  away  in  the  Serapis. 

In  the  Eevolution  the  British  lost  102  vessels  of  war,  while 
the  Americans  lost. 24  —  most  of  their  navy. 

160.  Revolutionary  Heroes.  —  It  is  not  possible  to  mention  all 
the  revolutionary  heroes  entitled  to  our  grateful  remembrance. 
We  should,  however,  remember  Lafayette,  Steuben,  Pulaski,  and 
DeKalb,  foreigners  who  fought  for  us ;  Samuel  Adams  and  James 
Otis  of  Massachusetts,  and  Patrick  Henry  of  Virginia,  who  spoke 
for  freedom ;  Kobert  Morris,  the  financier  of  the  Eevolution ; 
Putnam  who  fought  and  Warren  who  died  at  Bunker  Hill ; 
Mercer  who  fell  at  Princeton ;  Nathan  Hale,  the  martyr  spy ; 
Herkimer,  Knox,  Moultrie,  and  that  long  list  of  noble  patriots 
whose  names  have  already  been  mentioned. 

161.  The  Treaty  of  Peace. — The  story  is  told  that  when 
Lord  Xorth,  the  Prime  Minister  of  England,  heard  of  the  sur 
render  of  Yorktown,  he  threw  up  his  hands  and  said,  "It  is 
all  over."     He  was  right;  it  was  all  over,  and  011  September  3, 
1783,  a  treaty  of  peace  (negotiated   by  Benjamin  Franklin, 
John  Adams,  and  John  Jay)  was  signed  at  Paris. 

Meantime  the  British,  in   accordance  with   a   preliminary 


150  STRUGGLE   FOR   RIGHTS   OF   ENGLISHMEN 

treaty  of  peace  signed  in  November,  1782,  were  slowly  leaving 
the  country,  till  on  November  25,  1783,  the  last  of  them  sailed 
from  New  York.1  Washington  now  resigned  his  commission, 
and  in  December  went  home  to  Mt.  Vernon. 

162.  Bounds  of  the  United  States.  —  By  the  treaty  of  1783  the 
boundary  of  the  United  States  was  declared  to  be  about  what  is 
the  present  northern  boundary  from  the  mouth  of  the  St.  Croix 
River  in  Maine  to  the  Lake  of  the  Woods,  and  then  due  west  to 
the  Mississippi  (which  was,  of  course,  an  impossible  line,  for 
that  river  does  not  rise  in  Canada) ;  then  down  the  Mississippi 
to  31°  north  latitude  ;  then  eastward  along  that  parallel  of  lati 
tude  to  the  Apalachicola  River,  and  then  by  what  is  the  present 
north  boundary  of  Florida  to  the  Atlantic. 

But  these  bounds  were  not  secured  without  a  diplomatic 
struggle.  As  soon  as  France  joined  us  in  1778,  she  began  to 
persuade  Spain  to  follow  her  example.  Very  little  persuasion 
was  needed,  for  the  opportunity  to  regain  the  two  Floridas 
(which  Spain  had  been  forced  to  give  to  England  in  1763) 
was  too  good  to  be  lost.  In  June,  1779,  therefore,  Spain 
declared  war  on  England,  and  sent  the  governor  of  Lower 
Louisiana  into  West  Florida,  where  he  captured  Pensacola, 
Mobile,  Baton  Rouge,  and  Natchez.  Made  bold  by  this  suc 
cess,  Spain,  which  cared  nothing  for  the  United  States,  next 
determined  to  conquer  the  region  north  of  Florida  and  east  of 
the  Mississippi,  the  Indian  country  of  the  proclamation  of 
1763.  (See  map  on  p.  111.)  The  commandant  at  St.  Louis2 
was,  therefore,  sent  to  seize  the  post  at  St.  Joseph  on  Lake 
Michigan,  built  by  La  Salle  in  1679.  He  succeeded,  and  tak 
ing  possession  of  the  country  in  the  name  of  Spain,  carried 
off  the  English  flags  as  evidence  of  conquest.  Now  when  the 
time  came  to  make  the  treaty  of  peace,  Spain  insisted  that 

1  They  did  not  leave  Staten  Island  in  New  York  Bay  till  a  week  later. 
For  an  account  of  the  evacuation  of  New  York  see  McMaster's  With  the 
Fathers,  pp.  271-280. 

*  It  will  be  remembered  that  Spain  now  held  Louisiana,  or  the  country 
west  of  the  Mississippi.  (See  p.  91.) 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 


151 


she  must  have  East  and  West  Florida  and  the  country  west 
of  the  Alleghany  Mountains,  because  she  had  conquered  it. 
France  partly  supported  Spain  in  this  demand.  The  country 
north  of  the  Ohio  she  proposed  should  be  given  to  Great 
Britain,  and  the  country  south  to  Spain  and  the  United  States. 


RESULTS  OF  THE 
WAR  FOR  INDEPENDENCE 

BOUNDARY  DEFINED  BY  TREATY  1783. 
AND  TERRITORY  HELD  BY  GREAT  BRITAIN  O 

1783-179C..  AND  SPAIN  1783-1795 


The  American  commissioners,  seeing  in  all  this  a  desire  to 
bound  the  United  States  on  the  west  by  the  Alleghany  Moun 
tains,  made  the  treaty  with  Great  Britain  secretly,  and  secured 
the  Mississippi  as  our  western  limit. 

Spain  at  the  same  time  secured  the  Floridas  from  Great 


152  STRUGGLE   FOB   RIGHTS   OF  ENGLISHMEN 

Britain,  and  insisting  that  West  Florida  must  have  the  old 
boundary  given  in  1764,1  and  not  31°  as  provided  in  our  treaty 
of  peace,  she  seized  and  held  the  country  by  force  of  arms  j 
and  for  twelve  years  the  Spanish  flag  waved  over  Baton  Rouge 
and  Natchez.2 

The  area  of  the  territory  thus  acquired  by  the  United 
States  was  827,844  square  miles,  and  the  population  not  far 
from  3,250,000.  Apparently  an  era  of  great  prosperity  and 
happiness  was  before  the  people.  But  unhappily  the  govern 
ment  they  had  established  in  time  of  war  was  quite  unfit  to 
unite  them  and  bring  them  prosperity  in  time  of  peace. 


Washington's  sword 


SUMMARY 

1.  In  accordance  with  one  of  the  Intolerable  Acts,  General  Gage  became 

governor  of  Massachusetts  in  1774. 

2.  Seeing  that  the  people  were  gathering  stores  and  cannon,  he  attempted 

to  destroy  the  stores,  and  so  brought  on  the  battles  of  Lexington 
and  Concord,  which  opened  the  War  for  Independence. 

3.  The  Congress  of  colonial  delegates,  which  met  in  1774  and  adjourned 

to  meet  again  in  1775,  assembled  soon  after  these  battles,  and 
assumed  the  conduct  of  the  war,  adopted  the  army  around  Boston, 
and  made  Washington  commander  in  chief. 

4.  Washington   reached   Boston   soon   after  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill, 

which  taught  the  British  that  the  Americans  would  fight,  and  he 
besieged  the  British  in  Boston.  In  March,  177G,  they  left  the  city 
by  water,  and  Washington  moved  his  army  to  the  neighborhood  of 
New  York. 

5.  There  he  was  attacked  by  the  British,  and  was  driven  up  the  Hudson 

River  to  White  Plains.  Thence  he  crossed  into  New  Jersey,  only  to 
be  driven  across  the  state  and  into  Pennsylvania. 

iSeep.  110. 

2  Read  Hinsdale's  Old  Northwest,  pp.  170-191;    McMaster's  With  the 
Fathers,  pp.  280-292. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  INDEPENDENCE       153 

0.  On  Christmas  night,  1776,  he  recrossed  the  Delaware  to  Trenton,  and 
the  next  morning  won  a  victory  over  the  Hessians.  Then  on  Janu 
ary  3,  1777,  he  fought  the  battle  of  Princeton,  and  he  spent  the 
remainder  of  the  winter  at  Morristown. 

7.  In  July,  1777,  Howe  sailed  from  New  York  for  Philadelphia,  to  which 

city  Washington  hurried  by  land.  The  Americans  were  defeated  at 
the  Brandywine,  and  the  city  fell  into  the  hands  of  Howe.  Wash 
ington  passed  the  winter  of  1777-1778  at  Valley  Forge. 

8.  Meantime  an  attempt  had  been  made  to  cut  the  states  in  two  by 

getting  possession  of  New  York  state  from  Lake  Champlain  to  New 
York  city,  and  an  army  under  Burgoyne  came  down  from  Canada. 
He  and  his  troops  were  captured  at  Saratoga. 

9.  In  February,  1778,  France  made  a  treaty  of  alliance  with  us  and  sent 

over  a  fleet.  Fearing  this  would  attack  New  York,  Clinton  left 
Philadelphia  with  his  army.  Washington  followed  from  Valley 
Forge,  overtook  the  enemy  at  Monmouth,  and  fought  a  battle  there. 
The  British  then  went  on  to  New  York,  while  Washington  stretched 
out  his  army  from  Morristown  to  West  Point. 

10.  So  matters  remained  till  December,  1778,  when  the  British  attacked 

the  Southern  States.  They  conquered  Georgia  in  the  winter  of 
1778-1779. 

11.  In  the  spring  of   1780  they  attacked   South  Carolina  and  captured 

General  Lincoln.  Gates  then  took  the  field,  was  defeated,  and  suc 
ceeded  by  Greene,  who  after  many  vicissitudes  drove  the  British 
forces  in  South  Carolina  and  Georgia  into  Charleston  and  Savan 
nah,  during  1781. 

12.  Meantime  a  force  sent  against  Greene  under  Cornwallis  undertook  to 

fortify  Yorktown  and  hold  it,  and  while  so  engaged  was  surrounded 
by  Washington  and  the  French  fleet  and  forced  to  surrender. 


1775.  Concord  and  Lexington. 
Continental  Army  formed. 
Washington,  commander  in  chief. 
Battle  of  Bunker  Hill. 

1775-1776.     Siege  of  Boston. 

1776.  Evacuation  of  Boston. 


1775.     Arnold's  inarch  to  Quebec. 

Montgomery's  march  to  Montreal. 
Capture  of  Montreal. 

Defeat  and  death  of  Montgomery  at  Quebec. 
Americans  return  to  Ticonderoga. 

Continued  on  the  next  page. 


154 


STRUGGLE   FOR    RIGHTS    OF  ENGLISHMEN 


1770.     Howe  sails  for  New  York. 

Washington  marches  to  New  York. 
The  Declaration  of  Independence. 
Capture  of  New  York. 
Retreat  across  the  Jerseys. 
Surprise  at  Trenton. 

1777.  Battle  of  Princeton. 
Washington  at  Morristown. 

Burgoyne  and  St.  Leger  move  down  from  Canada  to 
capture  New  York  state  and  cut  the  colonies  in  two. 

St.  Leger  defeated  at  Fort  Stanwix. 

Burgoyne  captured  at  Saratoga. 

Howe  sails  from   New  York  to  Chesapeake  Bay  and 
moves  against  Philadelphia. 

Washington  moves  from  New  York  to  Philadelphia. 

Battles  of  Brandywine  and  Germantown. 

Philadelphia  captured  by  the  British. 
1777-1778.     Americans  winter  at  Valley  Forge. 

1778.  Alliance  with  France. 

Fleet  and  army  sent  from  France. 

Clinton  leaves  Philadelphia  and  hurries  to  New  York. 

Washington  follows  him  from  Valley  Forge. 

Battle  of  Monmouth. 

Washington  on  the  Hudson. 


1778.  The  South  invaded. 

Savannah  captured  and  Georgia  overrun. 

1779.  Clinton  ravages  Connecticut  to  draw  Washington  away 

from  the  Hudson. 
Wayne  captures  Stony  Point. 
Lincoln  attacks  Savannah. 

1780.  Clinton  captures  Charleston. 
Campaign  of  Gates  in  South  Carolina. 
Battles  of  Camden  and  Kings  Mountain. 
Treason  of  Arnold. 

1781.  Greene  in  command  in  the  South. 
Battle  of  the  Cowpens. 

March  of  Cornwallis  from  Charleston. 

Battle  of  Guilford  Courthouse. 

Cornwallis  goes  to   Wilmington   and  Greene  to  South 
Carolina.    • 

Cornwallis  goes  to  Yorktown. 

Washington  hurries  from  New  York. 

Surrender  of  Cornwallis. 
1782-1783.     Peace  negotiations  at  Paris. 
1783.     Evacuation  of  New  York. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 
CHAPTER   XII 

UNDER   TF1E   ARTICLES   OF   CONFEDERATION 

163     How  the  Colonies  became  States.  -  When  the  Continen 
tal  Congress  met  at  Philadelphia  on  May  10,  1775   a  letter 
was  received  from  Massachusetts,  where  the  people  had  penned 
up  the   governor   in   Boston  and  had  taken  the  government 
into  their  own  hands,  asking  what  they  should  do.     Congress 
replied  that  no  obedience  was  due  to  the  Massachusetts  Regu 
lating  Act   or  to  the    governor,    and  advised  the   people  to 
make  a  temporary  government  to  last  till  the  King  should 
restore  the  old  charter.     Similar  advice  was  given  the  same 
year  to  New  Hampshire  and   South  Carolina,  for  it  was  not 
then  supposed  that  the  quarrel  with  the  mother  country  would 
end  in  separation.     But  by  the  spring  of  1776  all  the  govern 
ors  of  the  thirteen  colonies  had  either  fled  or  been  thrown 
into  prison.     This  put  an   end   to  colonial   government,  and 
Congress,  seeing  that  reconciliation  was  impossible,  (May  15, 
1776)  advised  all  the  colonies  to  form  governments  for  them 
selves  (p.  132).     Thereupon  they  adopted  constitutions,   and 
by  doing 'so  turned  themselves  from  British  colonies  into  sov 
ereign  and  independent  states.1 

164.  Articles^of  Confederation. —While  the  colonies  were 
thus  gradually  turning  themselves  into  the  states,  the  Conti- 

i  All  but  two  made  new  constitutions  ;  but  Connecticut  and  Rhode 
Island  used  their  old  charters,  the  one  till  1818,  the  other  till  1842.  Ver 
mont  also  formed  a  constitution,  but  she  was  not  admitted  to  the  Con 
gress  (p.  243). 

155 


156 


°;<=-£  *£«.•£"     s  . 

^^^^5^5-g.l 

•S*2jO-£-o        I    g  O  | 


1.17 


158  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

nental  Congress  was  trying  to  bind  them  into  a  union  by 
means  of  a  sort  of  general  constitution  called  "Articles  of 
Confederation."  By  order  of  Congress,  Articles  had  been 
prepared  and  presented  by  a  committee  in  July,  1776,  but  it 
was  not  till  November  17,  1777,  that  they  were  sent. out  to 
the  states  for  adoption.  Now  it  must  be  remembered  that 
six  states,  Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  Virginia,  North  Caro 
lina,  South  Carolina,  and  Georgia,  claimed  that  their  "from 
sea  to  sea "  charters  gave  them  lands  between  the  mountains 
and  the  Mississippi  River,  and  that  one,  New  York,  had 
bought  the  Indian  title  to  land  in  the  Ohio  valley.  It  must 
also  be  remembered  that  the  other  six  states  did  not  have 
"  from  sea  to  sea  "  charters,  and  so  had  no  claims  to  western 
lands.  As  three  of  them,  New  Jersey,  Delaware,  and  Mary 
land,  held  that  the  claims  of  their  sister  states  were  invalid, 
they  now  refused  to  adopt  the  Articles  unless  the  land  so 
claimed  was  given  to  Congress  to  be  used  to  pay  for  the  cost 
of  the  Revolution.  For  this  action  they  gave  four  reasons: 

1.  The   Mississippi   valley   had   been   discovered,    explored, 

settled,  and  owned  by  France. 

2.  England  had  never  owned  any  land  there  till  France  ceded 

the  country  in  1763. 

3.  When  at  last  England  had  got  it,  in  1763,  the  King  drew 

the  " proclamation  line,"  turned  the  Mississippi  valley 
into  the  Indian  country,  and  so  cut  off  any  claim  of  the 
colonies  in  consequence  of  English  ownership. 

4.  The  western  lands  were  therefore  the  property  of  the  King, 

and  now  that  the  states  were  in  arms  against  him,  his 
lands  ought  to  be  seized  by  Congress  and  used  for  the 
benefit  of  all  the  states. 

For  three  years  the  land-claiming  states  refused  to  be  con 
vinced  by  these  arguments.  But  at  length,  finding  that  Mary 
land  was  determined  not  to  adopt  the  Articles  till  her  demands 
were  complied  with,  they  began  to  yield.  In  Fejbruary,  1780, 
New  York  ceded  her  claims  to  Congress,  and  in  January,  1781, 


UNDER   THE   ARTICLES   OF   CONFEDERATION         159 

Virginia  gave  up  her  claim  to  the  country  north  of  the  Ohio 
River.  Maryland  had  now  carried  her  point,  and  on  March  1, 
1781,  her  delegates  signed  the  Articles  of  Confederation.  As 
all  the  other  states  had  ratified  the  Articles,  this  act  on  the 
part  of  Maryland  made  them  law,  and  March  2,  1781,  Con 
gress  met  for  the  first  time  under  a  form  of  government  the 
states  were  pledged  to  obey. 

165.  Government  under  the  Articles  of  Confederation. — The 
form  of  government  that  went  into  effect  on  that  day  was  bad''' 
from  beginning  to  end.     There  was  no  one >  officer  to  carry  out~ 
the  laws,  no  court  or  judge  to  settle  disputed  points  of  law,   • 
and  only  a  very  feeble  legislature.     Congress  consisted  of  one 
house,  presided  over  by  a  president  elected  each  year  by  the 
members  from  among  their  own  number.     The  delegates  to 
Congress  could  not  be  more  than  seven,  nor  less  than  two' 
from  each  state,  were  elected  yearly,  could  not  serve  for  more 
than  three  years  out  of  six,   and  might  be  recalled  at  any 
time  by  the  states  that  sent  them.     Once  assembled  on  the 
floor  of  Congress,  the  delegates  became  members  of  a  secret 
body.     The  doors  were  shut;  no  spectators  were  allowed  to 
hear  what  was  said;  no  reports  of  the  debates  were  taken 
down ;  but  under  a  strict  injunction  to  secrecy  the  members 
went  on  deliberating  day  after  day.     All  voting  was  done  by 
states,  each  casting  but  one  vote,  no  matter  how  many  dele 
gates   it    had.      The   affirmative   votes    of   nine   states   were 
necessary  to  pass  any  important  act,   or,  as  it  was  called, 
"ordinance." 

To  this  body  the  Articles  gave  but  few  powers.  Congress 
could  declare  war,  make  peace,  issue  money,  keep  up  an  army 
and  a  navy,  contract  debts,  enter  into  treaties  of  commerce, 
and  settle  disputes  between  states.  But  it  could  not  enforce 
a  treaty  or  a  law  when  made,  nor  lay  any  tax  for  any  purpose. 

166.  Origin  of  the  Public  Domains  In  1784  Massachusetts 
ceded  her  strip  of  land  in  the  west,  following  the  example  set 
by  New  York  (1780),  and  Virginia  (1781). 

As  three  states  claiming  western  territory  had  thus  by  1784 


160  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR  A   GOVERNMENT 

given  their  land  to  Congress,  that  body  came  into  possession 
of  the  greater  part  of  the  vast  domain  stretching  from  the 
Lakes  to  the  Ohio  and  from  the  Mississippi  to  Pennsylvania.1 
Now  this  public  domain,  as  it  was  called,  was  given  on  certain 
conditions : 

1.  That  it  should  be  cut  up  into  states. 

2.  That  these  states  should  be  admitted  into  the  Union  (when 

they  had  a  certain  population)  on  the  same  footing  as  the 
thirteen  original  states. 

3.  That  the  land  should  be  sold  and  the  money  used  to  pay 

the  debts  of  the  United  States. 

Congress,  therefore,  as  soon  as  it  had  received  the  deeds  to 
the  tracts  ceded,  trusting  that  the  other  land-owning  states 
would  cede  their  western  territory  in  time,  passed  a  law  (in 
1785)  to  prepare  the  land  for  sale  by  surveying  it  and  marking 
it  out  into  sections,  townships,  and  ranges,  and  fixed  the  price 
per  acre. 

167.  Virginia   and    Connecticut    Reserves.  —  When  Virginia 
made  her  cession  in  1781,  she  expressly  reserved  two  tracts  of 
land  north  of  the  Ohio.     One,  called  the  Military  Lands,  lay 
betweeii  the   Scioto  and  Miami  rivers,  and  was  held  to  pay 
bounties  promised  to  the  Virginia  Revolutionary  soldiers.    The 
other  (in  the  present  state  of  Indiana)  was  given  to  General 
George  Rogers  Clark   and   his  soldiers.     A  third  piece  was 
reserved  by  Connecticut  when  she  ceded  her  strip  in  1786. 
This,   called  the  Western  Reserve  of  Connecticut,  stretched 
along  the  shore  of  Lake  Erie  (map,  p.  175).     In  1800  Con 
necticut  gave  up  her  jurisdiction,  or  right  of  government,  over 
this  reserve  in  return  for  the  confirmation  of  land  titles  she 
had  granted. 

168.  Ordinance  of  1787;  Origin  of  the  Territories.  —  Hardly 
had  Congress  provided  for  the  sale  of  the  land,  when  a  number 

1  The  strip  owned  by  Connecticut  had  been  offered  to  Congress  in 
October,  1780,  but  not  accepted.  It  still  belonged  to  Connecticut  in  1786. 
In  178G  it  was  again  ceded,  with  certain  reservations,  and  accepted. 


UNDER   THE   ARTICLES   OF   CONFEDERATION         161 

of  Eevolutionary  soldiers  formed  the  Ohio  Land  Company,  and 
sent  an  agent  to  New  York,  where  Congress  was  in  session, 
and  offered  to  buy  5,000,000  acres  on  the  Ohio  River:  1,500,- 
000  acres  were  for  themselves,  and  3,500,000  for  another  com- 


TERRITORY  OF  THE 

kee        UNITKD    STATES 

NORTHWEST  OF  THE 

OHIO  RIVER 

1787 


pany  called  the  Scioto  Company.  The  land  was  gladly  sold, 
and  as  the  purchasers  were  really  going  to  send  out  settlers^ 
it  became  necessary  to  establish  some  kind  of  government  for 
them.  On'the  13th  of  July,  1787,  therefore,  Congress  passed 
another  very  famous  law,  called -the  Ordinance  of  1787,  which 
ordered 


162  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

1.  That  the  whole  region  from  the  Lakes  to  the  Ohio,  and  from 

Pennsylvania  to  the  Mississippi,  should  be  called  "  The 
Territory  of  the  United  States  northwest  of  the  river 
Ohio." 

2.  That  it  should  be  cut  up  into  not  less  than  three  nor  more 

than  five  states,  each  of  which  might  be  admitted  into 
the  Union  when  it  had  (30,000  free  inhabitants. 

3.  That  within  it  there  was  to  be  neither^  slavery  nor  involun 

tary  servitude  except  in  punishment  for  crime. 

4.  That  until  such  time  as  there  were  5000  free  male  inhabit 

ants  twenty -one  years  old  in  the  territory,  it  was  to  be 
governed  by  a  governor  and  three  judges.  They  could 
not  make  laws,  but  might  adopt  such  as  they  pleased 
from  among  the  laws  in  force  in  the  states.  After  there 
were  5000  free  male  inhabitants  in  the  territory  the  peo 
ple  were  to  elect  a  house  of  representatives,  which  in  its 
turn  was  to  elect  ten  men  from  whom  Congress  was  to 
select  five  to  form  a  council.  The  house  and  the  coun 
cil  were  then  to  elect  a  territorial  delegate  to  sit  in 
Congress  with  the  right  of  debating,  not  of  voting.  The 
governor,  the  judges,  and  the  secretary  were  to  be  elected 
by  Congress.  The  council  and  house  of  representatives 
could  make  laws,  but  must  send  them  to  Congress  for 
approval. 

Thus  were  created  two  more  American  institutions,  the 
territory  and  the  state  formed  out  of  the  public  domain. 
The  ordinance  was  but  a  few  months  old  when  South  Carolina 
ceded  (1787)  her  little  strip  of  country  west  of  the  mountains 
(see  map  on  p.  157)  with  the  express  condition  that  it  should 
be  slave  soil.  In  1789  North  Carolina  ceded  what  is  now 
Tennessee  on  the  same  condition.  Congress  accepted  both  and 
out  of  them  made  the  "  Territory  southwest  of  the  Ohio  River." 
In  that  slavery  was  allowed.1 

1  The  only  remaining  land-holding  state,  Georgia,  ceded  her  claim  in 
1802  (p.  246). 


UNDER  THE   ARTICLES   OF   CONFEDERATION         163 


169.  Defects  of  the  Articles  of  Confederation.  —  While  Con 
gress  at  New  York  was  framing  the  Ordinance  of  1787,  a  con 
vention  of  delegates  from  the  states  was  framing  the  Consti 
tution  at  Philadelphia. t/ A  very  little  experience  under  the 
Articles  of  Confederation  showed  them  to  have  serious  defects. 

No  Taxing  Power.  —  In  the  first  place,  Congress  could  not 
lay  a  tax  of  any  kind,  and  as  it  could  not  tax  it  could  not 
get  money  with  which  to  pay  its  expenses  and  the  debt 
incurred  during  the  Kevolution.  Each  of  the  states  was  in 
duty  bound  to  pay .  its  share.  But  this  duty  was  so  disre 
garded  that  although  Congress  between  1782  and  1786  called 
on  the  states  for  $6,000,000,  only  $1,000,000  was  paid. 

No  Power  to  regulate  Trade.  — -  In  the  second  place,  Con 
gress  had  no  power  to  regulate  trade  with  foreign  nations, 
or  between  the  states.  This  proved  a  most  serious  evil.  The 
people  of  the  United  States  at  that  time  had  few  manufactures, 
because  in  colonial  days  Parliament  would  not  allow  them.  All 
the  china,  glass,  hardware,  cutlery,  woolen  goods,  linen,  muslin, 
and  a  thousand  other  things  were  imported  from  Great  Britain. 
Before  the  war  the  Americans  had  paid  for  these  goods  with 
dried  fish,  lumber,  whale  oil,  flour,  tobacco,  rice,  and  indigo, 
and  with  money  made  by  trading  in  the  West  Indies.  Now 
Great  Britain  forbade  Americans  to  trade  with  her  West 
Indies.  Spain  would  not  make  a  trade  treaty  with  us,  so  we 
had  no  trade  with  her  islands,  and  what  was  worse,  Great 
Britain  taxed  everything  that  came  to  her  from  the  United 
States  unless  it  came  in  British  ships.  As  a  consequence, 
very  little  lumber,  fish,  rice,  and  other  of  our  products  went 
abroad  to  pay  for  the  immense  quantity  of  foreign-made  goods 
that  came  to  us.  These  goods  therefore  had  to  be  paid  for  in 
money,  which  about  1785  began  to  be  boxed  up  and  shipped  to 
London.  When  the  people  found  that  specie  was  being  carried 
out  of  the  country,  they  began  to  hoard  it,  so  that  by  1786 
none  was  in  circulation. 

170.  Paper  Money  issued.  —  This   left   the  people  without 
any  money  with  which  to  pay  wages,  or  buy  food  and  clothing, 


164      THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 

and  led  at  once  to  a  demand  that  the  states  should  print  paper 
money  and  loan  it  to  their  citizens.  Rhode  Island,  New  York, 
New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  North  and  South  Carolina,  and 
Georgia  did  so.  But  the  money  was  no  sooner  issued  than  the 
merchants  and  others  who  had  goods  to  sell  refused  to  take  it, 
whereupon  in  some  of  the  states  laws  called  "  tender  acts " 
were  passed  to  compel  people  to  use  the  paper.  This  merely 
put  an  end  to  business,  for  nobody  would  sell.  In  Massachu 
setts,  when  the  legislature  refused  to  issue  paper  money,  many 
of  the  persons  who  owed  debts  assembled,  and,  during  1786-87, 
under  the  lead  of  Daniel  Shays,  a  Revolutionary  soldier,  pre 
vented  the  courts  from  trying  suits  for  the  recovery  of  money 
owed  or  loaned.1 

171.  Congress  proposes  Amendments.  —  Of  the  many  defects 
in  the  Articles,  the  Continental  Congress  was  fully  aware,  and 
it  had  many  a  time  asked  the  states  to  make  amendments. 
One  proposed  that  Congress  should  have  power  for  twenty-live 
years  to  lay  a  tax  of  five  per  cent  on  all  goods  imported,  and 
use  the  money  to  pay  the  Continental  debts.     Another  was  to 
require  each  state  to  raise  by  special  tax  a  sum  sufficient  to 
pay  its  yearly  share  of  the  current  expenses  of  Congress.     A 
third  was  to  bestow  on  Congress  for  fifteen  years  the  sole 
power  to  regulate  trade  and  commerce.      A  fourth  provided 
that  in  future  the  share  each,  state  was  to  bear  of  the  current 
expenses  should  be  in  proportion  to  its  population. 

But  the  Articles  of  Confederation  could  not  be  amended 
unless  all  thirteen  states  consented,  and,  as  all  thirteen  never 
did  consent,  none  of  these  amendments  were  ever  made. 

172.  The  States  attempt  to  regulate  Trade  and  fail.  —  In  the 
meantime  the  states  attempted  to  regulate  trade  for  themselves. 
New  York  laid  double  duties  on  English  ships.     Pennsylvania 
taxed  a  long  list  of  foreign  goods.    Massachusetts,  New  Hamp 
shire,  and  Rhode  Island  passed  acts  imposing  heavy  duties  on 

1  Read  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I., 
pp.  281-295,  304-329,  331-340 ;  Fiske's  Critical  Period  of  American  His 
tory,  pp.  168-186. 


MAKING  THE    CONSTITUTION  165 

articles  unless  they  came  in  American  vessels.  But  these  laws 
were  not  uniform,  and  as  many  states  took  no  action,  very  little 
good  was  accomplished.1 

173.  A  Trade  Convention  called  to  meet  at  Annapolis,  I786.2- 
Under  these  conditions,  the  business  of  the  whole  country 
was  at  a  standstill,  and  as  Congress  had  no  power  to  do  any 
thing  to  relieve  the  distress,  the  state  of  Virginia  sent  out  a 
circular  letter  .to  her  sister  states.  She  asked  them  to  appoint 
delegates  to  meet  and  "  take  into  consideration  the  trade  and 
commerce  of  the  United  States."  Four  (New  York,  New 
Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  Delaware)  responded,  and  their 
delegates,  with  those  from  Virginia,  met  at  Annapolis  in  Sep 
tember,  1786. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

MAKING  THE   CONSTITUTION 

174.  Call  for  the  Constitutional  Convention.  —  Finding  that 
it  could  do  nothing,  because  so  few  states  were  represented, 
and  because  the  powers  of  the  delegates  were  so  limited,  the 
convention  recommended  that  all  the  states  in  the  Union  be 
asked  by  Congress  to  send  delegates  to  a  new  convention, 
to  meet  at  Philadelphia  in  May,  1787,  "to  take  into  consid 
eration  the  situation  of  the  United  States,"  and  "  to  devise 
such  further  provisions  as  shall  appear  to  them  necessary  to 
render  the  Constitution  of  the  Federal  government  adequate  to 
the  exigencies  of  the  Union." 

1  McMaster's   History  of  the   People  of  the    United   /States,  Vol.  I., 
pp.    246-259,   26(5-280 ;    Fiske's   Critical   Period  of  American  History, 
134-137,  145-147. 

2  The  report  of  this  Annapolis  convention  is  printed  in  Bulletin  of 
Bureau  of  Soils  and  Library  of  the  Department  of  State,  No.  1,  Appendix, 
pp.  1-5. 


166 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


175.  The  Philadelphia  Convention.1  —  Early  in  1787  Congress 
approved  this  movement,  and  during  the  summer  of  1787  (May 
to  September)  delegates  from  twelve  states  (Ehode  Island  sent 
none),  sitting  in  secret  session  at  Philadelphia,  made  the  Con 
stitution  of  the  United  States. 


Independence  Chamber  - 

176.  The  Virginia  and  New  Jersey  Plans.  —  The  story  of  that 
convention  is  too  long  and  too  complicated  to  be  told  in  full.3 
But  some  of  its  proceedings  must  be  noticed.  While  the  dele- 

1  All  we  know  of  the  proceedings  of  this  convention  is  derived  from 
the  journals  of  the  convention,  the  notes  taken  down  by  James  Madison, 
the  notes  of  Yates  of  New  York,  and  a  speech  by  Luther  Martin  of  Mary 
land.    They  may  be  found  in  Elliot's  Debates,  Vol.  IV. 

2  The  room  where  the  Constitution  was  framed. 

8  For  short  accounts,  read  "  The  Framers  and  the  Framing  of  the  Con 
stitution  "  in  the  Century  Magazine,  September,  1887,  or  "Framing  the 
Constitution,"  in  McMaster's  With  the  Fathers,  pp.  106-149,  or  Thorpe's 
Story  of  the  Constitution,  Chautauqua  Course,  1891-92,  pp.  111-148. 


MAKING   THE    CONSTITUTION  167 

gates  were  assembling,  a  few  men,  under  the  lead  of  Madison, 
met  and  drew  up  the  outline  of  a  constitution,  which  was  pre 
sented  by  the  chairman  of  the  Virginia  delegation,  and  was 
called  the  "  Virginia  plan."  A  little  later,  delegates  from  the 
small  states  met  and  drew  up  a  second  plan,  which  was  the  old 
Articles  of  Confederation  with  amendments.  As  the  chairman 
of  the  Xew  Jersey  delegation  offered  this,  it  was  called  the  "New- 
Jersey  plan."  Both  were  discussed ;  but  the  convention  voted 
to  accept  the  Virginia  plan  as  the  basis  of  the  Constitution. 

177.  The  Three  Compromises.  —  This  plan  called,  among 
other  things,  for  a  national  legislature  of  two  branches:  a 
Senate  and  a  House  of  Representatives.  The  populous  states 
insisted  that  the  number  of  representatives  sent  by  each 
state  to  Congress  should  be  in  proportion  to  her  population. 
The  small  states  insisted  that  each  should  send  the  same 
number  of  representatives.  For  a  time  neither  party  would 
yield ;  but  at  length  the  Connecticut  delegates  suggested  that 
the  states  be  given  an  equal  vote  and  an  equal  representation 
in  the  Senate,  and  an  unequal  representation,  based  on  popu 
lation,  in  the  House.  The  contending  parties  agreed,  and  so 
made  the  first  compromise. 

But  the  decision  to  have  representation  according  to  popula 
tion  at  once  raised  the  question,  Shall  slaves  be  counted  as 
population  ?  This  divided  the  convention  into  slave  states  and 
free  (see  p.  186),  and  led  to  a  second  compromise,  by  which 
it  was  agreed  that  three  fifths  of  all  slaves  should  be  counted 
as  population,  for  the  purpose  of  apportioning  representation. 

A  third  compromise  sprang  from  the  conflicting  interests 
of  the  commercial  and  the  planting  states.  The  planting 
states  wanted  a  provision  forbidding  Congress  to  pass  navi 
gation  acts,  except  by  a  two-thirds  vote,  and  forbidding  any 
tax  on  exports ;  three  states  also  wished  to  import  slaves  for 
use  on  their  plantations.  The  free  commercial  states  wanted 
Congress  to  pass  navigation  laws,  and  also  wanted  the  slave 
trade  stopped,  because  of  the  three-fifths  rule.  The  result 
was  an  agreement  that  the  importation  of  slaves  should  not  be 
McM.  HIST.  — 10 


168  THE    STRUGGLE    FOTl   A   GOVERNMENT 

forbidden  by  Congress  before  1808,  and  that  Congress  miglit 
pass  navigation  acts,  and  that  exports  should  never  be  taxed. 

178.  The   Election   of   President. — Another   feature  of   the 
I  Virginia  plan  was  the  provision  for  a  President  whose  business 

it  should  be  to  see  that  the  acts  of  Congress  were  duly  en 
forced  or  executed.  But  when  the  question  arose,  How  shall 
he  be  chosen  ?  all  manner  of  suggestions  were  made.  Some 
said  by  the  governors  of  the  states;  some,  by  the  United 
States  Senate ;  some,  by  the  state  legislatures ;  some,  by  a 
body  of  electors  chosen  for  that  purpose.  When  at  last  it 
was  decided  to  have  a  body  of  electors,  the  difficulty  was  to 
determine  the  manner  of  electing  the  electors.  On  this  no 
agreement  could  be  reached;  so  the  convention  ordered  that 
the  legislature  of  each  state  should  have  as  many  electors 
of  the  President  as  it  had  senators  and  representatives  in 
Congress,  and  that  these  men  should  be  appointed  in  such 
way  as  the  legislatures  of  the  states  saw  fit  to  prescribe. 

179.  Sources  of   the  Constitution. — An  examination  of  the 
Constitution  shows  that  some  of  its  features  were  new;  that 
some  were  drawn  from  the  experience  of  the  states  under  the 
Confederation ;  and  that  others  were  borrowed  from  the  vari 
ous  state  constitutions.     Among  those  taken  from   state  con 
stitutions   are    such    names    as    President,  Senate,  House   of 
Representatives,  and  such  provisions  as  that  for  a  census,  for 
the  veto,  for  the  retirement  of  one  third  of  the  Senate  every  two 
years,  that  money  bills  shall  originate  in  the  House,  for  im 
peachment,  and  for  what  wre  call  the  annual  message.1 

The  features  based  directly  on  experience  under  the  Articles 
of  Confederation  are  the  provisions  that  the  acts  of  Congress 
must  be  uniform  throughout  the  Union;  that  the  President 
may  call  out  the  militia  to  repel  invasion,  to  put  down  insur 
rection,  and  to  maintain  the  laws  of  the  Union ;  that  Congress 
shall  have  sole  power  to  regulate  foreign  trade  and  trade  betiveen 
the  states.  No  state  can  now  coin  money  or  print  paper  money, 

i  On  the  sources  of  the  Constitution,  read  "The  First  Century  of  the 
Constitution  "  in  New  Princeton  Iteview,  September,  1887,  pp.  175-190. 


MAKING    THE    CONSTITUTION  169 

or  make  anything  hut  gold  or  silver  legal  tender.  Congress  now 
has  power  to  lay  taxes,  duties,  and  excises.  The  Constitution 
divides  the  powers  of  government  between  the  legislative  de 
partment  (Senate  and  House  of  Eepresentatives)  ;  the  executive 
department  (the  President,  who  sees  that  laws  and  treaties  are 
obeyed) ;  and  the  judicial  department  (Supreme  Court  and 
other  United  States  courts,  which  interpret  the  Constitution, 
the  acts  of  Congress,  and  the  treaties). 

The  new  features  are  the  definition  of  treason  and  the  limita 
tion  of  its  punishment ;  the  guarantee  to  every  state  of  a  repub 
lican  form  of  government ;  the  swearing  of  state  officials  to  sup 
port  the  Federal  Constitution;  and  the  provision  for  amendment. 

Among  other  noteworthy  features  are  the  creation  of  a  United 
States  citizenship  as  distinct  from  a  state  citizenship,  the  limi 
tation  of  the  powers  of  the  states ;  and  the  provision  that  the 
Constitution,  the  acts  of  Congress,  and  the  treaties  are  "the 
supreme  law  of  the  land/' 

180.  Constitution  submitted  to  the  People. — The  convention 
ended  its  work,  and  such  members  as  were  willing  signed  the 
Constitution  on    September  17,  1787.     Washington,  as  presi 
dent  of  the  convention,  then  sent  the  Constitution  to  the  Con 
tinental  Congress  sitting  at  New  York  and  asked  it  to  transmit 
copies  to  the  states  for  ratification.     This  was  done,  and  during 
the  next  few  months  the  legislatures  of  most  of   the  states 
called  on  the  people  to  elect  delegates  to  conventions  which 
should  accept  or  reject  the  Constitution. 

181.  Ratification  by   the   States.- — In   many   of   these  con 
ventions  great  objection  was  made  because  the  new  plan  of 
federal  government  was  so  unlike  the  Articles  of  Confedera 
tion,  and  certain  changes  were  insisted  on.     The   only   states 
that  accepted  it  just  as  it  was  framed  were  Delaware,  Pennsyl 
vania,    New    Jersey,    Georgia,    Connecticut,    and    Maryland. 
Massachusetts,  South  Carolina,  New  Hampshire,  New  York, 
and  Virginia  ratified  with  amendments.     (For  dates,  see  p.  176.) 

182.  /'The  New  Roof."— The   Constitution   provided   that 
|  when  nine  states  had  ratified,  it  should  go  into  effect  "between 


170  THE   STRUGGLE  FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

the  states  so  ratifying."  While  it  was  under  discussion  the 
Federalists,  as  the  friends  of  the  Constitution  were  named, 
had  called  it  "the  New  Roof,"  which  was  going  to  cover 
the  states  and  protect  them  from  political  storms.  They 
now  represented  it  as  completed  and  supported  by  eleven 
pillars  or  states.  Two  states,  Khode  Island  and  North 
Carolina,  had  not  ratified,  and  so  were  not  under  the  New 
Roof,  and  were  not  members  of  the  new  Union.  Eleven  states 
having  approved,  nothing  remained  but  to  fix  the  particular 
day  on  which  the  electors  of  President  should  be  chosen, 
and  the  time  and  place  for  the  meeting  of  the  new  Congress. 
This  the  Continental  Congress  did  in  September,  1788,  by 
ordering  that  the  electors  should  be  chosen  on  the  first  Wednes 
day  in  January,  1789,  that  they  should  meet  and  vote  for 
President  on  the  first  Wednesday  in  February,  and  that  the 
new  Congress  should  meet  at  New  York  on  the  first  Wednes 
day  in  March,  which  happened  to  be  the  fourth  day  of  the 
month.  Later,  Congress  by  law  fixed  March  4  as  the  day  on 
which  the  terms  of  the  Presidents  begin  and  end.1 

183.  How  Presidents  were  elected.  —  It  must  not  be  supposed 
that  our  first  presidents  were  elected  just  as  presidents  are 
now.  In  our  time  electors  are  everywhere  chosen  by  popular 
vote.  In  1788  there  was  no  uniformity.  In  Pennsylvania, 
Maryland,  and  Virginia  the  people  had  a  complete,  and  in 
Massachusetts  and  New  Hampshire  a  partial,  choice.  In  Con 
necticut,  Delaware,  New  Jersey,  South  Carolina,  and  Georgia 
the  electors  were  appointed  by  the  legislatures.  In  New 
York  the  two  branches  of  the  legislature  quarreled,  and  no 
electors  were  chosen. 

As  the  Constitution  required  that  the  electors  should  vote 
by  ballot  for  two  persons,  such  as  had  been  appointed  met  at 

1  The  question  is  often  asked,  When  did  the  Constitution  go  into 
force?  Article  VII.  says,  "The  ratification  of  the  conventions  of  nine 
states  shall  be  sufficient  for  the  establishment  of  this  Constitution  be 
tween  the  states  so  ratifying  the  same."  New  Hampshire,  the  ninth 
state,  ratified  June  21,  1788,  and  on  that  day,  therefore,  the  constitution 
was  "established"  between  the  nine. 


MAKING   THE   CONSTITUTION 


171 


their  state  capitals  on  the  first  Wednesday  in  February,  1789, 
made  lists  of  the  persons  voted  for,  and  sent  them  signed  and 
certified  under  seal  to  the  president  of  the  Senate.  But  when 
March  4,  1789,  came,  there  was  no  Senate.  Less  than  a 
majority  of  that  body  had  arrived  in  New  York,  so  no  busi 
ness  could  be  done.  When  at  length  the  Senate  secured  a 
majority,  the  House  was  still  without  one,  and  remained  so  till 
April.  Then,  in  the  presence  of  the  House  and  Senate,  the 
votes  on  the  lists  were  counted,  and  it  was  found  that  every 


Federal  Hall.  New  York  1 

elector  had  given  one  of  his  votes  for  George  Washington,  who 
was  thus  elected  President.  No  separate  ballot  was  then 
required  for  Vice  President.  Each  elector  merely  wrote  on  his 
ballot  the  names  of  two  men.  He  who  received  the  greatest 
number  of  votes,  if,  in  the  words  of  the  Constitution,  "  such 
number  be  a  majority  of  the  whole  number  of  electors  ap 
pointed/'  was  elected  President.  He  who  received  the  next 
highest,  even  if  less  than  a  majority,  was  elected  Vice  Presi 
dent.  In  1789  this  man  was  John  Adams  of  Massachusetts. 
1  From  an  old  print,  made  in  1797. 


MAKING   THE   CONSTITUTION  173 

184.  The  First  Inauguration. — As  soon  as  Washington  re 
ceived  the  news  of  his  election,  he  left  Mount  Vernon  and  started 
for  New  York.  His  journey  was  one  continuous  triumphal 
inarch.  The  population  of  every  town  through  which  he  passed 
turned  out  to  meet  him.  Men,  women,  and  children  stood  for 
hours  by  the  roadside  waiting  for  him  to  go  by.  At  New  York 
his  reception  was  most  imposing,  and  there,  on  April  30,  1789, 
standing  on  the  balcony  in  front  of  Federal  Hall  (p.  171),  he 
took  the  oath  of  office  in  the  presence  of  Congress  and  a  great 
multitude  of  people  that  filled  the  streets,  and  crowded  the 
windoAvs,  and  sat  on  the  roofs  of  the  neighboring  houses.1 

SUMMARY 

1.  When   independence    was  about   decided  on,  Congress  appointed  a 

committee  to  draft  a  general  plan  of  federal  government. 

2.  This  plan,  called  Articles  of  Confederation,  Maryland  absolutely  re 

fused  to  ratify  till  the  states  claiming  land  west  of  the  Alleghany 
Mountains  ceded  their  claims  to  Congress. 

3.  New  York  and  Virginia  having  ceded  their  claims,  Maryland  ratified 

in  March,  1781. 

4.  These  cessions  were  followed  by  others  from  Massachusetts  and  Con 

necticut  ;  and  from  them  all,  Congress  formed  the  public  domain 
to  be  sold  to  pay  the  debt. 

5.  The  sale  of  this  land  led  to  the  land  ordinance  of  1785  and  the  ordi 

nance  of    1787,  for  the  government  of    the  domain   and  the  new 
political  organism  called  the  territory. 

6.  The  defects  of  the  Articles  made  revision  necessary,  and  produced 
.  such  distress  that  two  conventions  were  called  to  consider  the  state 

of  the  country.      That  at  Annapolis  attempted  nothing.      That  at 
Philadelphia  framed  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States. 

7.  The  Constitution  was  then  passed  to  the  Continental  Congress,  which 

sent  it  to  the  legislatures  of  the  states  to  be  by  them  referred  to 
conventions  elected  by  the  people  for  acceptance  or  rejection. 

8.  Eleven  having  ratified,  Congress  in  1788  fixed  a  day  in  1789  (which 

happened  to   be  March  4),  .when   the   First  Congress  under  the 
Constitution  was  to  assemble. 

9.  The  date  of  the  first  presidential  election  was  also  fixed,  and  George 

Washington  was  made  our  first  President. 

1  Full  accounts  of  the  inauguration  of  Washington  may  be  found  in 
Harper-s  Magazine,  and  also  in  the  Century  Magazine,  for  April,  1889. 


174 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


The  Colonies  adopt 
Constitutions  and 
become  States. 


Articles  of  Confed 
eration. 


The  Territories. 

The  President. 
The  Congress. 

The  Judiciary. 
The  Secretaries. 


1776.  New   Hampshire,    Connecticut,   Rhode 

Island,  New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania, 
Delaware,  Maryland,  Virginia,  North 
Carolina,  South  Carolina. 

1777.  New  York,  Georgia. 
1780.     Massachusetts. 


Constitution  of  the 
United  States. 


Framed  by  Congress  1776-1777. 

Adopted  by  the  states  1777-1781. 

In  force  March  1,  1781. 

Kind  of  government. 

Defects.     Result  of  the  defects. 

Trade  convention  at  Annapolis. 

Constitutional  convention  called. 

Proceedings  of  the  convention. 
The  three  compromises. 
Sources  of  the  Constitution. 
Original  features. 
Derived  features. 
Ratification  by  the  states. 
[  The  Constitution  in  force. 

Land  claims  of  seven  states. 
Demands  for  the  surrender  of  the  west 
ern  territory. 

The  cessions  by  the  states. 
Ordinance  of  1785. 
Ordinance  of  1787. 
Territorial  government  created. 

J  Manner  of  electing. 

'[  Inauguration  of  Washington. 


f  Organization  of  the  First  under  the  Constitu- 
[     tion. 


{The  Supreme  Court. 
The  Circuit  Court. 
The  District  Courts. 


?'  s 

a' 


Secretary  of  State. 
Secretary  of  Treasury. 
Secretary  of  War. 
The  Attorney-general. 
Origin  of  the  "Cabinet.1 


(See  pp.  197, 198.) 


CHAPTER   XIV 


OUR   COUNTRY   IN    1790 


185.  The  States.  —  What  sort  of  a  country,  and  what  sort  of 
people,  was  Washington  thus  chosen  to  rule  over  ?  When  he 
was  elected,  the  Union  was  composed  of  eleven  states,  for 
neither  Rhode  Island  nor  North  Carolina  had  accepted  the 


175 


176  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

Constitution.1  Vermont  had  never  been  a  member  of  the 
Union,  because  the  Continental  Congress  would  not  recognize 
her  as  a  state. 

186.  Only  a  Part  inhabited.  —  Three  fourths  of  our  country 
was  then  uninhabited  by  white  men,  and  almost  all  the  people 
lived  near  the  seaboard.    Had  a  line  been  drawn  along  what  was 
then  the  frontier,  it  Avould  (as  the  map  on  p.  177  shows)  have  run 
along  the  shore  of  Maine,  across  New  Hampshire  and  Vermont 
to  Lake  Champlain,  then  south  to  the  Mohawk  valley,  then 
down   the  Hudson   River,  and   southwestward   across   Penn 
sylvania  to  Pittsburg,  then  south  along  the  Blue  Eidge  Moun 
tains  to  the  Altamaha  River  in  Georgia,  and  by  it  to  the  sea. 
How  many  people  lived  here  was  never  known  till  1790.     The 
Constitution  of  the   United   States  requires  that  the  people 
shall  be  counted  once  in  each  ten  years,  in  order  that  it  may 
be  determined  how  many  representatives  each  state  shall  have 
in  the  House  of  Representatives ;  and  for  this  purpose  Con 
gress  ordered  the  first  census  to  be  taken  in  1790.     It  then 
appeared  that,  excluding   Indians,  there  were    living  in  the 
eleven  United  States  3,380,000  human  beings,  or  less  than 
half  the  number  of  people  who  now  live  in  the  single  state  of 
New  York. 

187.  How  the  People  were  scattered.  — More  were  in  the  South 
ern  than  in  the  Eastern  States.     Virginia,  then  the  most  popu 
lous,  contained  one  fifth.     Pennsylvania  had  a  ninth,  while  in 
the  five  states  of  Maryland,  Virginia,  the  two  Carolinas,  and 
Georgia  were  almost  one  half  of  the  English-speaking  people 
of  the  United  States.     These  were  the  planting  states,  and, 
populous  as  they  were,  they  had  but  two  cities  —  Baltimore  and 
Charleston.     Savannah,  Wilmington,  Alexandria,  Norfolk,  and 

1  The  states  ratified  the  Constitution  on  the  dates  given  below : 


1.    Delaware     .     . 
2.     Pennsylvania   . 

.     .    Dec.    7,  1787 
.     .     Dec.  12,  1787 
Dec   18  1787 

8.  South  Carolina  . 
9.  New  Hampshire  . 

.     .      May  23,  1788 
.     .     June  21,  1788 
June  26  1788 

4.     Georgia 

Jan.  2,  1788 

.     July  26  1788 

5.     Connecticut 
6.     Massachusetts  . 
7.    Maryland     .    . 

.     .       Jan.  8,  1788 
.    .      Feb.  7,  1788 
.    .    April  28,  1788 

1-2.  North  Carolina  . 
13.  Rhode  Island  .  . 

.     .     Nov.  21,  1789 
.    .     May  29,  1790 

«     I      T      I      S      H  P 


DISTRIBUTION 

OF  THE 

POPULATION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

FIRST  CENSUS,  1790 


177 


178 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


Eiclimond  were  small  towns.  Not  one  had  8000  people  in  it. 
Indeed,  the  inhabitants  of  the  six  largest  cities  of  the  country 
(Boston,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  Charleston,  and 
Salem)  taken  together  were  but  131,000. 


Boston  in  1790  l 

188.  The  Cities.  — And  how  different  these  cities  were  from 
those  of  our  day  !  What  a  strange  world  Washington  would 
find  himself  in  if  he  could  come  back  and  walk  along  the 
streets  of  the  great  city  which  now  stands  on  the  banks  of 
the  Potomac  and  bears  his  name !  He  never  in  his  life  saw  a 
flagstone  sidewalk,  nor  an  asphalted  street,  nor  a  pane  of  glass 
six  feet  square.  He  never  heard  a  factory  whistle ;  he  never 
saw  a  building  ten  stories  high,  nor  an  elevator,  nor  a  gas  jet, 
nor  an  electric  light;  he  never  saw  a  hot-air  furnace,  nor 
entered  a  room  warmed  by  steam. 

In  the  windows  of  shop  after  shop  would  be  scores  of 
articles  familiar  enough  to  us,  but  so  unknown  to  him  that  he 
could  not  even  name  them.  He  never  saw  a  sewing  machine, 
nor  a  revolver,  nor  a  rubber  coat,  nor  a  rubber  shoe,  nor  a  steel 
pen,  nor  a  piece  of  blotting  paper,  nor  an  envelope,  nor  a  post- 

1  From  the  Massac?nts<>tts  Magazine,  November,  1790. 


CUE   COUNTRY   IN   1790 


179 


age  stamp,  nor  a  typewriter.  He  never  struck  a  match,  nor 
sent  a  telegram,  nor  spoke  through  a  telephone,  nor  touched  an 
electric  bell.  He  never  saw  a  railroad,  though  he  had  seen  a 
rude  form  of  steamboat.  He  never  saw  a  horse  car,  nor  an 
omnibus,  nor  a  trolley  car,  nor  a  ferryboat.  Fancy  him  board 
ing  a  street  car  to  take  a  ride.  He  would  probably  pay  his 
fare  with  a  "nickel."  But  the  "nickel"  is  a  coin  he  never 
saw.  Fancy  him  trying  to  understand  the  advertisements 
that  would  meet  his  eye  as  he  took  his  seat !  Fancy  him  star 
ing  from  the  window  at  a  fence  bright  with  theatrical  posters, 
or  at  a  man  rushing  by  on  a  bicycle ! 


Philadelphia  in  1800  (Arch  Street) 

189.  Newspapers  and  Magazines. — A  boy  enters  the  car 
with  half  a  dozen  daily  newspapers  all  printed  in  the  same 
city.  In  Washington's  day  there  were  but  four  daily  papers 
in  the  United  States !  On  the  news  counter  of  a  hotel,  one 
sees  twenty  illustrated  papers,  and  fifty  monthly  magazines. 


180 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 


A  Franklin  press 


In  his  day  there  was  no -illustrated  paper,  no  scientific  peri 
odical,  no  trade  journal,  and  no  such  illustrated  magazines 

as  Harper 's,  Scribneijs,  the  Cen 
tury,  St.  Nicholas.  VAll  the  print 
ing  done  in  the  country  was  done 
on  presses  worked  by  hand.  To 
day  the  Hoe  octuple  press  can 
print  96,000  eight-page  newspapers 
an  hour.  To  print  this  number 
on  the  hand  press  shown  in  the 
picture  would  have  taken  so  long 
that  when  the  last  newspaper  was 
printed  the  first  would  have  been 
three  months  old !  v 

190.  The  Fire  Service. — The  am 
bulance,  the  steam  fire  engine,  the 
hose  cart,  the  hook  and  ladder 
company,  the  police  patrol,  the 

police  officer  on  the  street  corner,  the  letter  carrier  gathering 

the  mail,  the  district  messenger  boy,  the  ex 
press  company,  the  delivery  wagon  of  the 

stores,  have  all  come  in  since  Washington 

died.     In  his  day  the  law  required  every 

householder  in  the  city  to  be  a  fireman.    His 

name  might  not  appear  on  the  rolls  of  any 

of  the  fire  companies,  he  might  not  help 

to  drag  through  the  streets  the  lumbering 

tank  which  served  as  a  fire  engine,  but  he 

must    have    in  his   hall,   or  beneath  the 

stairs,  or  hanging  up  behind  his  shop  door, 

at  least  one  leathern  bucket  inscribed  with 

his  name,  and  a  huge  bag  of  canvas  or  of 

duck.     Then,  if  he  were  aroused   at  the 

dead  of  night  by  the  cry  of  fire  and  the 

clanging  of  every  church  bell  in  the  town,  he  seized  his  bucket 
1  Original  in  the  Pennsylvania  Historical  Society. 


A  fire  bucket 


OUR   COUNTRY   IN    1790 


181 


and  his  bag,  and,  while  his  wife  put  a  lighted  candle  in  the 

ivindow  to  illuminate   the   street,   set  off  for  the  tire.     The 

smoke  or  the  flame  was  his  guide,  for  the  custom  of  indicating 

the  place  by  a  number  of  strokes  on  a  bell  had  not  yet  come 

in.     When  at  last  he  arrived  at  the  scene  he  found  there  no 

idle  spectators.     Every  one  was  busy.     Some  hurried  into  the 

building  and  filled  their  sacks  with  such  movable  goods  as 

came  nearest  to  hand.     Some  joined  the  line  that  stretched 

away   to   the   water,  and  helped  to  pass  the  full  buckets  to 

those   who  stood   by  the 

fire.      Others   took   posts 

in   a    second    line,    down 

which  the  empty  buckets 

were     hastened     to     the 

pump.     The  house  would 

often   be   half   consumed 

when  the  shouting  made 

known    that    the    engine 

had  come.    It  was  merely 

a  pump  mounted  over  a 

tank.     Into  the  tank  the 

water  from  the  buckets  was  poured,  and  it  was  pumped  thence 

by  the  efforts  of  a  dozen  men. 

191.  The  Post  Office.  —  Washington  sees  a  great  wagon  or  a 
white  trolley  car  marked  United  States  Mail,  and  on  inquiry  is 
told  that  the  money  now  spent  by  the  government  each  year 
for  the  support  of  the  post  offices  would  have  more  than  paid 
the  national  debt  when  he  was  President.  He  hears  with  amaze 
ment  that  there  are  now  75,000  post  offices,  and  recalls  that  in 
1790  there  were  but  seventy-five.  He  picks  up  from  the  side 
walk  a  piece  of  paper  with  a  little  pink  something  on  the 
corner.  He  is  told  that  the  portrait  on  it  is  his  own,  that  it 
is  a  postage  stamp,  that  it  costs  two  cents,  and  will  carry  a 
letter  to  San  Francisco,  a  city  he  never  heard  of,  and,  if  the 
person  to  whom  it  is  addressed  cannot  be  found,  will  bring  the 
1  From  an  old  cut. 


Fire  engine  of  1800 ! 


182  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

letter  back  to  the  sender,  a  distance  of  over  5000  miles.  In 
his  day  a  letter  was  a  single  sheet  of  paper,  no  matter  how 
large  or  small,  and  the  postage  011  it  was  determined  not  by 
weight,  but  by  distance,  and  might  be  anything  from  six  to 
twenty-five  cents. 

At  that  time  postage  must  always  be  prepaid,  and  as  the  post 
office  must  support  itself,  letters  were  not  sent  from  the  country 
towns  till  enough  postage  had  been  deposited  at  the  post  office 
to  pay  the  expense  of  sending  them.  Newspapers  and  books 
could  not  be  sent  by  mail. 

\'  192.  The  Franchise Taking  the  country  through,  the  con 
dition  of  the  people  wras  by  no  means  so  happy  as  ours.  They 
had  government  of  the  people,  but  it  was  not  by  the  people 
nor  for  the  people.  Everywhere  the  right  to  vote  and  to  hold 
office  was  greatly  restricted.  The  voter  must  have  an  estate 
worth  a  certain  sum,  or  a  specified  number  of  acres,  or  an 
annual  income  of  so  many  dollars.  But  the  right  to  vote  did 
not  carry  with  it  the  right  to  hold  office.  More  property  was 
required  for  office  holding  than  for  voting,  and  there  were 
besides  certain  religious  restrictions.  In  New  Hampshire, 
New  Jersey,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  and  Georgia,  the 
governor,  the  members  of  the  legislature,  and  the  chief  officers 
of  state  must  be  Protestants.  In  Massachu,  etts  and  Maryland 
they  must  be  Christians.  All  these  restrictions  were  long  since 
swept  away. 

193.  Cruel  Punishments.  —  The  humane  spirit  of  our  times 
was  largely  wanting.     The  debtor  was  cast  into  prison.     The 
pauper  might  be  sold  to  the  highest  bidder.     The  criminal  was 
dragged  out  into  open  day  and  flogged  or  branded.     From  ten 
to  nineteen  crimes  were  punishable  with  death.    No  such  thing 
as  a  lunatic  asylum,  or  a  deaf  and  dumb  asylum,  or  a  peniten 
tiary  existed.     The  prisons  were  dreadful  places.     Men  came 
out  of  them  worse  than  they  went  in. 

194.  The  Condition  of  the  Laborer;  of  the  well  to  do.  —  Men 
worked  harder  and  for  less  money  then  than  now.     A  regular 
working  day  was  from  sunrise  to  sunset,  with   an   hour   for 


OUR   COUNTRY   IN   1790 


183 


breakfast  and   an   hour   for   dinner.     Sometimes  the  laborer 

was  fed  and  lodged  by  the  employer,  in  which  case  he  was 

paid  four  dollars  a 

month  in  winter  and 

six  in  summer.   Two 

shillings  (30  cents) 

a  day  for  unskilled 

labor    was    thought 

high  wages. 

Even  the  houses 
of  the  well  to  do 
were  much  less  com 
fortable  places  than 
are  such  abodes  in 
our  day.  There 
were  no  furnaces,  no 
gas,  no  bathrooms, 
no  plumbing.  Wood 
was  the  universal 

fuel.     Coal  from  Virginia  and  Rhode  Island  was  little  used. 
All  cooking  ,  ,  was  done  in  "  Dutch  ovens,"  or  in  "  out  ovens," 


Washington's  flute  and  Miss  Custis's  harpsichord  at 
Mount  Vernon 


Earthenware  stove  —  Moravian 


Dutch  oven1 


1  The  bread,  or  meat,  to  be  baked  was  put  into  the  pot,  and  hot  coals 
were  heaped  all  around  the  sides  and  on  the  lid,  which  had  a  rim  to  keep 
the  coals  on  it. 


184 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


or  in  the  enormous  fireplaces  to  be 
found  in  every  household.  Wood 
fuel  made  sooty  chimneys,  and  sooty 
chimneys  took  fire.  In  every  city, 
therefore,  were  men  known  as 
"  sweeps,"  whose  business  it  was  to 
clean  chimneys. 

Washington  was  a  farmer,  yet  he 
never  in  his  life  beheld  a  tomato,  nor  a  cauliflower,  nor  an  egg 
plant,  nor  a  horserake,  nor  a  drill,  nor  a  reaper  and  binder,  nor 


A  foot  stove 


Kitchen  in  Washington's  headquarters  in  Morristown,  N.J.1 

a  threshing  machine,  nor  a  barbed  wire  fence.     His  land  Avas 

plowed    with    a    wooden 

plow    partly    shod    with 

iron.     His  seed  was  sown 

by  hand ;  his  hay  was  cut 

with   scythes  ;    his    grain  A  plow  used  in  1776 

1  This  shows  a  fine  specimen  of  the  old-fashioned  fireplace.  Notice  the 
andirons,  the  bellows,  the  lamp,  the  spinning  wheel,  the  old  Dutch  clock, 
and  the  kettles  hanging  on  the  crane  over  the  logs. 


OUH   COUNTRY   IN   1790  185 

was  reaped  with  sickles,  and  threshed  on  the  barn  floor  with 
flails  in  the  hands  of  his  slaves. 

195.  Negro  Slavery. — No  living  person  under  thirty  years 
of  age  has  ever  seen  a  negro  slave  in  our  country.  When 
Washington  was  President  there  were  700,000  slaves.  When 
the  Revolution  opened,  slavery  was  permitted  by  law  in  every 
colony.  But  the  feeling  against  it  in  the  North  had  always 
been  strong,  and  when  the  war  ended,  the  people  began  the 
work  of  abolition.  In  Massachusetts  and  New  Hampshire 
the  constitutions  of  the  states  declared  that  "all  men  are  born 
free  and  equal,"  and  that  "all  men  are  born  equally  free," 
and  this  was  understood  to  abolish  slavery.  In  Pennsylvania, 
slavery  was  abolished  in  1780.  In  Ehode  Island  and  Con 
necticut  gradual  abolition  laws  were  passed  which  provided 
that  all  children  born  of  slave  parents  after  a  certain  day 
should  be  free  at  a  certain  age,  and  that  their  children  should 
never  be  slaves.  The  Ordinance  of  1787  had  prohibited  slavery 
in  the  Northwest  Territory.  But  in  1790  New  York,  New 
Jersey,  Delaware,  Maryland,  and  all  the  states  south  of  these 
were  slave  states.  (See  map  on  the  next  page.) 

Though  slaves  were  men  and  women  and  children,  they  had 
no  civil  rights  whatever.  They  could  be  bought  and  sold, 
leased,  seized  for  a  debt,  bequeathed  by  will,  given  away.  If 
they  made  anything,  or  found  anything,  or  earned  anything,  it 
belonged  not  to  them,  but  to  their  owners.  They  were  prop 
erty  just  as  oxen  or  horses  were  in  the  North.  It  was  un 
lawful  to  teach  them  to  read  or  write.  They  were  not  allowed 
to  give  evidence  against  a  white  man,  nor  to  travel  in  bands 
of  more  than  seven  unless  a  white  man  was  with  them,  nor  to 
quit  the  plantation  without  leave. 

IE  a  planter  provided  coarse  food,  coarse  clothes,  and  a 
rude  shelter  for  his  slaves,  if  he  did  not  work  them  more 
than  fifteen  hours  out  of  twenty-four  in  summer,  nor  more 
than  fourteen  in  winter,  and  if  he  gave  them  every  Sunday  to 
themselves,  he  did  quite  as  much  for  their  comfort  as  the 
law  required  he  should. 


186 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


B    V 


178T1 


L     A 


o    s 


MAP 

SHOWING  THE  AREA  OF 

SLAVE  AND  FREE  SOIL, 

IN  1790 


If  the  slave  committed  any  offense,  if  he  stole  anything, 
or  refused  to  work,  or  ran  away,  it  was  lawful  to  load  him 
with  irons,  to  confine  him  for  any  length  of  time  in  a  cell, 
and  to  beat  him  and  whip  him  till  the  blood  ran  in  streams 
from  the  wounds,  and  he  grew  too  weak  to  stand.  Old 


^v    c^_ 

OUR  COUNTRY  IN  175BT  '187 

X 

advertisements  are  ^tiM  extant  in  which  runaway  blacks  are 
described  by  the  scars  left  upon  their  bodies  by  the  lash. 
When  such  lashings  were  not  prescribed  by  the  court,  they 
commonly  given  under  the  eye  of  the  overseer,  or  in- 
flictecTby  the  owner  himself. 

j|  196.  Six  Days  from  Boston  to  New  York.  —  Our  country 
was  small  when  Washington  was  President.  The  people 
lived  on  the  seaboard.  The 
towns  and  cities  were  not 
actually  very  far  apart; 
but  the  means  of  travel 
were  so  poor,  the  time  con 
sumed  in  going  even  fifty 
miles  was  so  great,  that  the 
country  was  practically  im 
mense  in  extent.  Now  we 
step  into  a  beautifully 
fitted  car,  heated  by  steam, 
lighted  by  electricity,  richly 
carpeted,  and  provided  with 
most  comfortable  seats  and 
beds,  and  are  whirled 
across  the  continent  from 
Philadelphia  to  San  Fran 
cisco  in  less  time  than  it  took  Washington  to  go  from  New 
York  to  Boston. 

If  you  had  lived  in  1791  and  started,  say,  from  Boston,  to 
go  to  Philadelphia  to  see  the  President  and  the  great  city 
where  independence  had  been  declared,  you  would  very  likely 
have  begun  by  making  your  will,  and  bidding  good-by  to  your 
friends.  You  would  then  have  gone  down  to  the  office  of 
the  proprietor  of  the  stagecoach,  and  secured  a  seat  to  New 
York.  As  the  coach  left  but  twice  a  week,  you  would  have 

1  In  many  parts  of  the  country  where  there  was  no  water  power,  as 
Cape  Cod,  Long  Island,  Nantucket,  etc.,  flour  was  ground  at  windmills. 
The  windmill  shown  in  the  picture  was  built  in  1787,  and  is  still  in  use. 
McM.  HIST. —11 


Old  mill  at  West  Falmouth,  Mass.1 


188  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

waited  till  the  day  came  and  would  then  have  presented 
yourself,  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning,  at  the  tavern 
whence  the  coach  started. 

The  stagecoach  was  little  better  than  a  huge  covered  box 
mounted  on  springs.  It  had  neither  glass  windows,  nor  door, 
nor  steps,  nor  closed  sides.  The  roof  was  upheld  by  ten 
posts  which  rose  from  the  body  of  the  vehicle,  and  the  body 
was  commonly  breast  high.  From  the  top  were  hung  cur 
tains  of  leather,  to  be  rolled 'up  when  the  day  was  fine,  and  let 
down  and  buttoned  when  it  was  rainy  and  cold.  Within  were 
four  seats.  Without  was  the  baggage.  Fourteen  pounds  of 
luggage  were  allowed  to  be  carried  free  by  each  passenger.  But 
if  your  portmanteau  or  your  brass-nail-studded  hair  trunk 
weighed  more,  you  would  have  paid  for  it  at  the  rate  per  mile 
that  you  paid  for  yourself.  Under  no  circumstances,  however, 
would  you  be  permitted  to  take  on  the  journey  more  than  150 
pounds.  When  the  baggage  had  all  been  weighed  and  strapped 
on  the  coach,  when  the  horses  had  been  attached,  and  the  way 
bill,  containing  the  names  of  the  passengers,  made  out,  the 
passengers  would  clamber  to  their  seats  through  the  front  of  the 
stage  and  sit  down  with  their  faces  toward  the  driver's  seat. 

One  pair  of  horses  usually  dragged  the  coach  eighteen  miles, 
when  a  fresh  pair  would  be  attached,  and  if  all  went  well,  you 
would  be  put  down  about  ten  at  night  at  some  wayside  inn 
or  tavern  after  a  journey  of  forty  miles.  Cramped  and  weary, 
you  would  eat  a  frugal  supper  and  hurry  off  to  bed  with  a 
notice  from  the  landlord  to  be  ready  to  start  at  three  the  next 
morning.  Then,  no  matter  if  it  rained  or  snowed,  you  would 
be  forced  to  make  ready  by  the  dim  light  of  a  horn  lantern, 
unknown  now,  for  another  ride  of  eighteen  hours. 

If  no  mishaps  occurred,  if  the  coach  was  not  upset  by  the 
ruts,  if  storm  or  flood  did  not  delay  you  at  Springfield,  where 
the  road  met  the  Connecticut,  or  at  Stratford,  where  it  met  the 
Housatonic,  each  of  which  had  to  be  crossed  on  clumsy  flat- 
boats,  the  stage  would  roll  into  New  York  at  the  end  of  the 
sixth  day. 


OUR  COUNTRY  IN  1700 


189 


197.  Two  Days  from  New  York  to  Philadelphia.  —  And  here 
a  serious  delay  was  almost  certain  to  occur,  for  even  in  the 
best  of  weather  it  was  no  easy  matter  to  cross  the  Hudson  to 
New  Jersey.  When  the  wind  was  high  and  the  water  rough, 
or  the  river  full  of  ice,  the  boldest  did  not  dare  to  risk  a  cross 
ing.  Once  over  the  river,  you  would  again  go  on  by  coach, 


Stagecoach  and  inn  * 

and  at  the  end  of  two  more  days  would  reach  Philadelphia. 
In  our  time  one  can  travel  in  eight  hours  the  entire  distance 
between  Boston  and  Philadelphia,  a  distance  which  Washing 
ton  could  not  have  traversed  in  less  than  eight  days. 

198.    The  Roads  and  the  Inns.  —  The  newspapers  and  the 

travelers  of  those  days  complained  bitterly  of  the  roads  and 

the  inns.      On  the  best  roads  the  ruts  were  deep,  the  descents 

precipitous,  and  the  passengers  were  often  forced  to  get  out 

1  From  a  print  of  1798. 


190  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 

and  help  the  driver  pull  the  wheels  out  of  the  mud.  Break 
downs  and  upsets  were  of  everyday  occurrence.  Yet  bad  as 
the  roads  were,  the  travel  was  so  considerable  that  very  often 
the  inns  and  taverns  even  in  the  large  cities  could  not  lodge 
all  who  applied  unless  they  slept  live  or  six  in  a  room. 

199.  A  Steamboat  on  the  Delaware.  —  Rude  as  this  means  of 
travel  seems  to  us,  the  men  of  1790  were  quite  satisfied  with 
it,  and  absolutely  refused  to  make  use  of  a  better  one.     Had 
you  been  in  Philadelphia  during  the  summer  of  1790  and  taken 
up  a  copy  of   TJie  Pennsylvania  Packet,  you  could  not  have 
failed  to   notice   this   advertisement  of    the   first   successful 
steamboat  in  the  world: 

The  Steam-Boat 

IS  now  ready  to  take  Paflengcrs,  and  is  intended  to 
fet  off  from  Arch  flreet  Ferry  in  Philadelphia  CTC- 
ry  Monday i  Wedntffay  and  Friday,  for  Burli»^tont 
Briftol.  Bordetttownznd  Trenton,  to  return  on  Tufflays9 
Tburfdajs  and  Saturday!— Price  for  Paffenger*,  »/5  to 
Burlington  and  Briftol,  3/9  to  Bordentown,  5/*.  to 
Trenton* June  14,  tu.th  f  tf 

This  boat  was  the  invention  of  John  Fitch,  and  from  June 
to  September  ran  up  and  down  the  Delaware;  but  so  few 
people  went  on  it  that  he  could  not  pay  expenses,  and  the 
boat  was  withdrawn. 

200.  To  the  Great  West.  —  From  Philadelphia  went  out  one 
of  the  great  highways  to  what  was  then  the  far  West,  but  to 
what  we  now  know  as  the  valley  of  the  Ohio.     The  traveler 
who  to-day  makes  the  journey  from  Philadelphia  to  Pittsburg 
is  whisked  on  a  railroad  car  through  an  endless  succession  of 
cities  and  villages  and  rich  farms,  and  by  great  factories  and 
mills  and  iron  works,  which  in  the  days  of  Washington  had 
no  existence.     He  makes  the  journey  easily  between  sunrise 
and  sunset.     In  1790  he  could  not  have  made  it  in  twelve  days. 

201.  Towns  beyond  the  Alleghany  Mountains.  —  Though  the 
country  between  the  Alleghany  Mountains  and  the  Mississippi 


OUR  COUNTRY  IN  1790 


191 


had  been  closed  to  settlement  from  1763  to  1776  by  the  King's 
proclamation,  it  was  by  no  means  without  population  in  1790. 
At  Detroit  and  Kaskaskia  and  Vincennes  were  old  French 
settlements,  made  long  before  France  was  driven  out  of 
Louisiana.  But  there  were  others  of  later  date.'  The  hardy 
frontiersman  of  1763  cared  no  more  for  the  King's  proclama 
tion  than  he  did  for  the  bark  of  the  wolf  at  his  cabin  door. 
The  ink  with  which  the  document  was  written  had  not  dried 
before  emigrants  from  Maryland  and  Virginia  and  Pennsyl 
vania  were  hurrying  into  the  valley  of  the  Monongahela. 

In  1769  William  Bean  crossed  the  mountains  from  North 
Carolina,   and,    building  a  cabin   on  the  banks  of  Watauga 


Model  of  Fitch's  steamboat1 

Creek,  began  the  settlement  of  Tennessee.  James  Robertson 
and  a  host  of  others  followed  in  1770,  and  soon  the  valleys  of 
the  Clinch  and  the  Holston  were  dotted  with  cabins.  In 
1769  Daniel  Boone,  one  of  the  grandest  figures  in  frontier 
history,  began  his  exploits  in  what  is  now  Kentucky,  and 
before  1777  Boonesboro,  Harrodsburg,  and  Lexington  were 
founded. 

202.  State  of  Franklin.  —  Before  the  Revolution  closed,  emi 
grants  under  James  Robertson  and  John  Donelson  planted 
Nashville  and  half  a  dozen  other  settlements  on  the  Cumber 
land,  in  middle  Tennessee.  After  the  Revolution  ended,  so 
many  settlers  were  in  eastern  Tennessee  that  they  tried  to 

1  Now  in  the  National  Museum,  Washington. 


192  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   A   GOVERNMENT 

make  a  new  state.  North  Carolina,  following  the  example  of 
her  Northern  sisters,  ceded  to  Congress  her  claim  to  what  is 
now  Tennessee  in  1784.  But  the  people  on  the  Watauga  no 
sooner  heard  of  it  than  under  the  lead  of  John  Sevier  they 
organized  the  state  of  Franklin,  whereupon  North  Carolina 
repealed  the  act  of  cession  and  absorbed  the  new  state  by 
making  the  Franklin  officials  her  officials  for  the  district  of 
Tennessee.  In  1789  she  again  ceded  the  district,  and  in  May 
of  that  year  Tennessee  became  part  of  the  public  domain. 

203.  Squatters  in  Ohio.  —  The  cession  to  Congress  of  the 
land  north  of  the  Ohio  led  to  an  emigration  from  Virginia  and 
Kentucky  to  what  is  now  the  state  of  Ohio.     As  this  terri 
tory  was  to  be  sold  to  pay  the  national  debt,  Congress  was 
forced  to  order  the  squatters  away,  and  when  they  refused  to 
go,  sent  troops  to  burn  their  cabins,  destroy  their  crops,  and 
drive  them  across  the  Ohio.     The  lawful  settlement  of  the 
territory  began  after  the  Ohio  and  Scioto  companies  bought 
their  lands  in  1787,  and  John  C.  Symmes  purchased  his  in  1788. 

204.  Pittsburg  in  1790. — At  Pittsburg,  then  the  greatest 
town  in  the  United  States  west  of  the  Alleghany  Mountains, 
were  some   200  houses,  mostly  of  logs,  and  2000  people,  a 
newspaper,  and  a  few  rude  manufactories.     The  life  of  the 

town  was  its  river  trade. 
Pittsburg  was  the  place 
where  emigrants  "  fitted 
out"  for  the  West.  A 
settler  intending  to  go 
down  the  Ohio  valley  with 
his  family  and  his  goods 
would  lay  in  a  stock  of 

The  first  millstones  and  salt  kettle  in  Ohio       POwder  and  ball>  bl1^  fl°Ur 

and  ham  .enough  to  last 

him  for  a  month,  and  secure  two  rude  structures  which  passed 
under  the  name  of  boats. 

205.  A  Trip  down  the  Ohio  in  1790.  —  In  the  long  keel  boat 
he  would  put  his  wife,  his  children,  and  such  travelers  as  had 


OUR   COUNTRY   IN   1790 


193 


been  waiting  at  Pittsburg  for  a  chance  to  go  down  the  river. 
In  the  fiatboat  would  be  his  cattle  or  his  stores.  Two  dan 
gers  beset  the  voyager  on  the  Ohio.  His  boat  might  become 
entangled  in  the  branches  of  the  trees  that  overhung  the  river, 
or  be  fired  into  by  the  Indians  who  lurked  in  the  woods.  The 
cabin  of  the  keel  boat,  therefore,  was  low,  that  it  might  glide 
under  the  trees,  and  the  roof  and  sides  were  made  as  nearly 
bullet-proof  as  possible.  The  whole  craft  was  steered  by  a 
huge  oar  mounted  on  a  pivot  at  the  stern.1 

206.    Towns  along  the  Ohio. — As  the  emigrant  in  such  an 

ark  floated  down  the  river,  he  would  come  first  to  Wheeling, 

a   town   of   fifty   log   cabins,  and  then   to  Marietta,   a   town 

planted  in  Ohio  in  1788  by  settlers  sent  by  the  Ohio  Com- 

1  See  the  boats  in  the  pictures  on  p.  194. 


194 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


Cincinnati  in  1802  (Fort  Washington) 

pany.  Below  Marietta  were  Belpre  and  Gallipolis,  a  settlement 
made  by  Frenchmen  brought  there  by  the  Scioto  Company.  Yet 
farther  down,  on  the  Kentucky  side,  were  Limestone  (now 
Maysville)  and  Newport,  opposite  which  some  settlers  were 
founding  the  city  of  Cincinnati.  Once  past  Cincinnati,  all  was 
unbroken  wilderness  till  one  reached  Louisville  in  Kentucky, 
beyond  which  few  emigrants  had  yet  ventured  to  go. 

207.  Cotton  Planting.  —  The  South,  in  1790,  was  on  the  eve 
of  a  great  industrial  revolution.  The  products  of  the  states 
south  of  Virginia  had  been  tar,  pitch,  resin,  lumber,  rice,  and 
indigo.  But  in  the  years  following  the  peace  the  indigo  plants 


Farmers'  Castle  (Belpre)  in  1791 


OUR   COUNTRY   IN   1790 


195 


had  been  destroyed  year  after  year  by  an.  insect.  As  the  plant 
was  not  a  native  of  our  country,  but  was  brought  from  the  West 
Indies,  it  became  necessary  either  to  import  more  seed  plants, 
or  to  raise  some  other  staple.  Many  chose  the  latter  course, 
and  about  1787  began  to  grow  cotton. 

208.  Whitney  and  the  Cotton  Gin.  —  The  experiment  suc 
ceeded,  but  a  serious  difficulty  arose.  The  cotton  plant  has 
pods  which  when  ripe  split 
open  and  show  a  white 
woolly  substance  attached 
to  seeds.  Before  the  cotton 
could  be  used,  these  seeds 
must  be  picked  out,  and  as 
ohe  labor  of  cleaning  was 
very  great,  only  a  small 
quantity  could  be  sent  to 
market.  It  happened,  how 
ever,  that  a  young  man 
from  Massachusetts,  named 
Eli  Whitney,  was  then  liv 
ing  in  Georgia,  and  he,  see 
ing  the  need  of  a  machine 
to  clean  cotton,  invented 
the  cotton  gin.1  Till  then, 
a  negro  slave  could  not 
clean  two  pounds  of  cotton 
in  a  day.  With  the  gin  the 
same  slave  in  the  same  time  could  remove  the  seeds  from  a 
hundred  pounds.  This  solved  the  difficulty,  and  gave  to  the 
United  States  another  staple  even  greater  in  value  than  tobacco. 
In  1792  one  hundred  and  ninety-two  thousand  pounds  of  cotton 
were  exported  to  Europe ;  in  1795,  after  the  gin  was  invented, 
six  million  pounds  wrere  sent  out  of  the  country.  In  1894  no 
less  than  4275  million  pounds  were  raised  and  either  consumed 
or  exported.  Of  all  the  marvelous  inventions  of  our  country- 
J  The  word  "  gin  "  is  a  contraction  of  "  engine," 


The  cotton  gin 

A,  Whitney's  original  gin.    B,  A  later  form. 


1% 


Till-;  STKIK;<;U<;    KOK    A    GOVERNMENT 


mnii,  thin  produced  tho  vory  tfroatont  oonBoquorioos.  It  inado 
coil-on  planting  profitable}  it,  brought  iinmonHU  wealth  to  the 
pooplo  of  tho  Houtli  ovory  year  ;  it  oovorod  Now  England  with 
c.otton  inillH;  and  by  junking  Hlavo  labor  profitablo  it  did  morn 
t.luin  anything  O!HO  to  f','i,Kt,on  nlavcry  on  tho  (Tnitod  HtatoH  for 
Hovonty  yoarn,  and  finally  to  bring  on  tho  Civil  War,  tho  most 
I.ITI  ililc  ::l,ni;'!' |c  ol  niodcrii  liiiiOH. 


8UMMAET 

1.  Whnn  WiiHliiiiKl'm   WRH  inaugunitcd,  UHI  United  Siaicm  coiiHintod  of 

rlnvrn  HI.SI.I.CH,  with  a  populiil.ion  ol  nbout,  :'.,:',KO,<MK>. 

2.  Thwi  pnoj)lo   livod   not,   far    from    Mm    Atlantic,   coant.       Kow  cities 

(ixintcd  ;    not,  one  had  r.O.OOO  inlialiitaniH.      Kvr.ii  Mm  InrftOHt  was 
wiMiont  in  in  v  con vcniciiccH  wliit'h  \v<-  OOXUddM  DOOMMtfiML 

3.  Travel   was  H!OW  and   difficult,   and   though  a  steamboat   had  been 

invented  and  UHcd,  it  WH.H  too  far  ahead  of  tho  MincH  to  Hiiccood. 

4.  Went  of  the  Allcghany  MountaiiiH  a  few  HetMi>iiiiMitM  had  been  made 

between   170,'J  and   I7H,'}.     Hut  it  waH  after  IVH.'J,  when  Htreanm  of 
etnlgrft&tl  poured  over  the  inountaiiiH,  that  HettlenuMJt  really  be^an. 
•  •     In  tlio  SniiMi   cotton   \v.i.:   jiiHt  beginning  to  be  cultivated  ;    there  nil 
I.I|>MI  w;i".  diiiic  by  Hlavi^H.      In  the  North  Hlavery  waw  dying  out,  and 
in  flvo  of  the  Htal.eM  had  been  aboliHhed. 


Number. 

I   In      popllliliioll. 

DiHtribution. 

y 

Movement  went. 

8 

•' 

(  Si/e. 

rH 

o 

The  cltius.               |  Absence  of  many  c.onvonienecH  known  to  us. 

$ 

I    NrwHp.'i.perH  Mini  m;ir,;i./.incM. 

j 

jj 

Had  roadH.     Slow  travel. 

B 

5 

<    '.illllllllllK.ll  K  >ll 

Tho  pimt  oHlccH. 

/ 

between  stateH. 

The  Hta^ecoacheH.     The  inns. 

H 

Tim  early  Hteamboat. 

B 

Population.     S(|iiattors. 

§ 

H 

///,  thr,  Ohio  valley. 

1'ittHburK  in  171M>. 
A  trip  down  the  Ohio. 

; 

TOWIIH  in  the  valley.. 

C/J 

(Sin  ATI  y. 

<  lotton  plantinf 

Wliiiii.  \  and  tho  cotton  gill. 

CHAT  IT.K    XV 

TIIK    KISK,    OK    PAIiTIMS 


209.  Oi>Muimii}>  lll<%  Nrw  (ioveninient.  —  The  President   li.iv 

illjj  lieen  in.ui'Mir.iled,  and  UK-  new  ".oveni  nienl  l.uil\  e.|.il» 
lished,  it.  l>ee;mie  the  duty  ol'  Congress  l«>  6UftOl  -nfli  l.i\\  |  .1  ; 
were  needed  i  m  med  1,1  1  el  y  .  Tin*  lirsl  ;iel  p.i:.  ,ed  I  •  y  ('IMI--I.  -.: 
in  I  i'X)  \\.ii  therefore  n.  l;inlT  ;M-|.  l;i\ni';  ilnluv;  on  >•.<»«'<  I:, 

Wiin-S,     illlll      inriTli.UHll:,.'      lin|K)||r(|      ml.)     |,||i<      I'nil.cil      Sl.lh  •: 
rii:;ioiulMMIsrs     NVrre    I  lien     r  .1  .1  1  -I  I:;!MM|     ;ill.l     OUltOmi     .ll.hi.'l:; 
ni:i.rl\r«l   mil,    ;in<l    perl;;   <>|    enlry  ;nul    |»orl:i   ol'   ilrlivn\    doilg 
liiilnl   ;     |To\  i:.imi     w.i.;    ni.ide     Inr    Hi.-    ::ii  \>\  ..  >rl.    ol      I  i".li!.|i«ni  ;••  ; 
;i  lid  1  MM  i  •«  Hi  .  ,    I  lie  <  'r<  1  1  n;i  ncc  <  1  1    \  ,    •  ,    lor  !  lie  ;M  >  vein  menl,  t»l   |.ho 

i  '  i  ni  in  !«•  ,  \\.i,   .h"iiii\  rii.iii'Tii  .in.)  i  i-cii.ii  led  ,   i  he  depart" 

inrnl,.1;  dl  Sl.:il.r,  \\'.n,  .iml  'rrr.ir.nrv  \\''n-  r;.|  .1  !  »l  i  .In-.  !  ,  .mil  ;i 
r.i  II  \\  ;i:;  ni;n  Ic  <  >n  Mn>  Scrrrl  ;i  r\  t>l  l.lic  'l'rc.i;.ii  ry  (,<>  ivpoi  I.  .1  pl.iu 
I0r  |>;i\  i  urn  I.  <»!'  I  In*  old  (  'onl  i  nml  .1  1  drill 

210.  The    Ulliled    SlMlr:;   CninlM.          The  <  'on  .1  ilul  ion   dee!  ...    ; 
|,li;il,  j.lie  Jildiei;il    power  <  d'  Hie    IhllLed   Sl.il>    :     .lull    In-    \.    .1.  d    in 
oiio    Supreme   ('onrl,   ;iml    Mieli    inlerior   OOUfll  M  tho  OO&gNM 
m;iy    I'roin    I  line    |o    Inn.-   oid.nn    ;md    «•:  .1  ,i  I  >l  i:ih.       Acini",   under 
(In,:    |>ower,    OODgtttl    Ddftdf    pi"\i.i"ii    l"i     .1.    Supreme    ('onrl, 
eon:;i:;l  Hi",    ol'    ;i,  (  'li  |e  I'  .)  u  ,1  !,-.•  .1  nd    li  \  e    \  .,..,•  1.1  1  e  .1  n;.|  iee::,   ;md 
ni:irl.ed     onl     I  lie      I  'inlcd     Mil.,     int..     ,  n.  ml  ;     .md     dl  .1  riel::. 
Tlio    enciiil  :    \\rn-    three    in    niiiiilier.       In    I.  he    In  .1     \\<-re    I,  ho 
I1',.  i  ..I  «  -i  M    ,  '-I  ..it.  •:  ,     HI    MM        <'  <>nd,    I  he     Middle    Sl.ilie::.     ,ind    111    I.  he 
l.llird,    I.  he   ;  '«  HI!  h<   i  n    i'.l.ih  •::         'I'oeiieh    Were    .i..i"iied     two    .lllS- 
tloi         (d      'I'-      Sllpl'ollie     ('.mil,    u  ho-:e     I  n  i:  .  1  1  te  ,.  :     ||.   w.i:l    lo    |-_o   to 
B  ......  •  eil  v    in  •  111  h     I'l'    in  I.  In-  en-end.,   .md    Mioro,   wilh  l-lio  dis- 

trir.l,     ndt«    -d    |.|,.,.|.   ;,|..|r,    h.dd    .1.   eirenil.   eouii.       The   district 


198      THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 

courts  were  thirteen  in  number,  one  being  established  in  each 
state.1  Washington  appointed  John  Jay  the  first  Chief  Jus^ 
tice  of  the  Supreme  Court. 

211.  The  Secretaries.  —  During  the  management  of  affairs  by 
the  Continental  Congress  three  great  executive  departments 
had  gradually  grown  up  and  been  placed  in  charge  of  three 
men,  called  the  "Superintendent  of  Finance,"  the  '''Secretary 
of  the  United  States  for  the  Department  of  Foreign  Affairs," 
and  the  "Secretary  of  War."     These  the  Constitution  recog 
nized  in  the  expression  "principal  officer  in  each  of  the  ex 
ecutive  departments."     Congress  by  law  now  continued  the 
departments  and  placed  them  in  charge  of  a  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,    a   Secretary    of   State,    and   a   Secretary  of   War. 
Washington   filled  the  offices  promptly,    making  Alexander 
Hamilton  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  Thomas  Jefferson  Secre 
tary  of  State,  and  General  Henry  Knox  Secretary  of  War. 

212.  The  "Cabinet."  —  It  has  long  been  the  custom  for  the 
President  to  gather  his  secretaries  about  him  on  certain  days 
in  each  week  for  the  purpose  of  discussing  public  measures. 
To  these  gatherings  has  been  given  the  name  "Cabinet  meet 
ings,"  while  the  secretaries  have  come  to  be  called  "Cabinet 
officers."     The  Constitution,  however,  never  intended  to  give 
the  President  a  body  of  advisers.     Indeed,  a  proposition  to 
provide  him  with  a  council  was  voted  down  in  the  constitu 
tional  convention.     But  Washington  at  once  began  to  consult 
the  Chief  Justice,  the  Vice  President,  his  three  secretaries, 
and  the  Attorney-general  on  matters  of  importance.     At  first 
he  asked  their  opinions  individually  and  in  writing,  but  toward 
the  end  of  his  first  term  he  convened  a  general  meeting  of  the 
heads  of  departments,  and  by  so  doing  set  a  custom  out  of 
which,  in  time,  the  "  Cabinet "  has  grown. 

213.  The  Origin  of  the  National  Debt.  —  As  soon  as  Hamilton 
was  made  Secretaiy  of  the  Treasury,  it  became  his  duty,  in 
accordance  with  an  order  from  Congress,  to  prepare  a  plan  for 
the  payment  of  the  debts  contracted  by  the  Continental  Con- 

1  For  later  changes,  see  Andrews's  Manual  of  the  Constitution,  p.  183. 


THE   RISE   OF   PARTIES 


199 


gress.  When  that  body  was  unexpectedly  called  on,  in  May, 
1775,  to  conduct  the  war,  it  had  nothing  with  which  to  pay 
expenses,  and  was  forced  to  use  all  sorts  of  means  to  raise 
money. 

214.  Paper  Money.  —  The  first  resort  was  the  issue,  dur 
ing  1775  and  1776,  of  six  batches  of  Continental  "bills  of 
credit,"  amounting  in  all  to  $36,000,000.  These  "bills" 
were  rudely  engraved  bits  of  paper,  stating  on  their  face  that 

"  This  bill  entitles  the  bearer  to  receive Spanish  milled 

dollars,  or  the  value  thereof  in 
gold  or  silver."  They  were  is 
sued  in  sums  of  various  denomi- 


a  RESO 
LUTION  OF 
CONGRESS, 

parted  at 


Continental  money 

nations,  from  one  sixth  of  a  dollar  up,  and  were  to  be  redeemed 
by  the  states.  The  amount  assigned  each  state  for  redemp 
tion  was  in  proportion  to  the  supposed  number  of  its  inhab 
itants. 

215.  Loan-office  Certificates.  —  In  1776  Congress  tried  another 
means.  It  opened  a  loan  office  in  each  state  and  called  on 
patriotic  people  to  come  forward  and  loan  it  money,  receiving 
in  return  pieces  of  paper  called  "loan-office  certificates." 
Interest  was  to  be  paid  on  these ;  but  after  a  while  Congress, 
having  no  money  with  which  to  pay  interest,  was  forced  to 
resort  to  another  form  of  paper,  called  "  interest  indents." 


200  THE   STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 

216.  The  Congress  Lottery.  —  The  loan  office  having  failed 
to  bring  in  as  much  money  as  was  needed,  Congress,  toward 
the  close  of  1776,  was  driven  to  seek  some  other  way,  and 
resorted  to  a  lottery.     A  certain  number  of  tickets  were  sold, 
after  which  a  drawing  took  place,   and  all  who  drew  prizes 
were  given  certificates  payable  at  the  end  of  five  years. 

217.  More  Bills  of  Credit.  — But  the  sale  of  tickets  went  off 
so  slowly  that  Congress  had  to  go  back  to  the  issue  of  bills 
of  credit.     In  1777,  therefore,  the  printing  press  was  again 
put  to  work,  and  issues  were  made  in  rapid  succession,  till 
more  than  $ 200,000,000  in  Continental  paper  were  in  circula 
tion. 

218.  The  "  New  Tenor."  —  Then  the  Continental  bills  ceased 
to  circulate,  and  in  March,  1780,  Congress  called  in  the  old 
money  and  offered  to  exchange  it  for  a  new  issue,  giving  one 
dollar  of  the  new  paper  money,  or  "new  tenor,"  for  forty 
dollars  of  the  old.     But  the  attempt  to  restore  credit  by  such 
means  was  a  failure,  and  by  the  end  of  the  year  1781  all  paper 
money  ceased  to  circulate. 

219.  Certificates.  —  Long  before  this  time  officials  had  been 
forced  to  pay  debts  contracted  in  the  name  of  Congress  with 
other  kinds  of  paper,  called  certificates,  and  known  as  treas 
ury,  commissary,  quartermaster,  marine,  and  hospital  certifi 
cates,  according  to  the  department  issuing  them.     To  these 
must  be  added  the  "  final  settlements, "  or  certificates  given  to 
the  soldiers  at  the  end  of  the  war  in  payment  of  their  services. 

220.  Foreign  Debt.  —  Besides  the  debt  thus  contracted  at 
home,  Congress  had  borrowed  a  great  sum  in  Europe. 

221.  The  National  Debt  in  1790.  —  Thus  the  debt  contracted 
by  the  Continental  Congress  consisted  of  two  parts.     1.    The 
foreign  debt,  due  to  France,  Holland,  and  Spain,  and  amount 
ing,  Hamilton  found,   to  $11,700,000.     2.    The    domestic  or 
home  debt,  of  $42,000,000.     But  the  states   had  also  fallen 
into  debt  because  of  their  exertions  in  the  war.     Just  how 
great  the  state  debts  were  could  not  be  determined,  but  they 
were  estimated  to  be  $21,500,000. 


THE   RISE   OF  PARTIES 

222.  Assumption  and  Funding.— For  the  redemption  of  this 
debt  Hamilton  prepared  two  measures,  —  the  funding,  or,  as 
we  should  say,  the  bonding,  of  the  foreign  and  Continental 
debt,  and  the  assuming  and  funding  of  the  state  debts.     This 
was  done,  and  Congress  ordered  stock  bearing  interest  to  be 
issued  in  exchange  for  the  old  debts,  and  so  established  our 
national  debt,  which  in  1790  amounted  to  $75,000,000. 

223.  The  National  Capital.  —  Funding  the  state  debts  was 
strongly  opposed  by  many  congressmen,  and  was  not  carried 
till  a  bargain  was  made  by  which  it  was  agreed  that  if  enough 
members  from  Virginia  and  Pennsylvania  would  support  the 
measure  to  secure  its  passage  through  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  the  national  government  should  be  removed  from 
New  York  to  Philadelphia  for  ten  years,  and  after  that  to  a 
city  to  be  built  on  the  Potomac.     This  was  faithfully  carried 
out,  and  in  the  summer  of  1790  the  government  offices  were 
removed  to  Philadelphia,  where  they  remained  till  the  summer 
of  1800,  when  they  were  removed  to  Washington  in  the  Dis 
trict  of  Columbia. 

224.  The  Bank  of  the  United  States.  —  The  troublesome  ques 
tions  of  funding  and  assumption  thus  disposed  of,  Congress 
called  on  Hamilton  for  a  report  011  the  further  support  of 
public  credit,  and  when  it  met  in  the  session  of  1790-91,  re 
ceived  a  plan  for  a  great  National  Bank,  with  a  capital  of 
$10,000,000.     The  United  States  was  to  raise  $2,000,000 ;  the 
rest  was  to  be  subscribed  for  by  the  people.     The  bank  was  to 
keep  the  public  revenues,  was  to  aid  the  government  in  mak 
ing  payments  all  over  the  country.     To  do  this,  power  was 
given  to  the  parent  bank  (which  must  be  at  Philadelphia)  to 
establish  branches  in  the  chief  cities  and  towns,  and  to  issue 
bank  bills  which  should  be  received  all  over  the  United  States 
for   public   lands,  taxes,  duties,  postage,  and  in  payment  of 
any  debt  due  the  government.     Great  opposition  was  made ; 
but  the  charter  was  granted  for  twenty  years,  and  in  1791  the 
Bank  of  the  United  States  began  business. 

The  effect  of  these  two  measures,  funding  the  debt  and 


202 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  A  GOVERNMENT 


The  first  Bank  of  the  United  States 


establishing  a  bank,  was  immediate.  Confidence  and  credit 
were  restored.  Money  that  the  people  had  long  been  hiding 

away  was  brought  out 
and  invested  in  all 
sorts  of  new  enter 
prises,  such  as  banks, 
canal  companies,  man 
ufacturing  companies, 
and  turnpike  com 
panies. 

225.  "Federalists" 
and     "  Republicans." 
-  When  the  Consti 
tution  was  before  the 
people  for  acceptance 

or  rejection  in  1788,  they  were  divided  into  two  bodies.  Those 
who  wanted  a  strong  and  vigorous  federal  government,  who 
wanted  Congress  to  have  plenty  of  power  to  regulate  trade, 
pay  the  debts  of  the  country,  and  raise  revenue,  supported  the 
Constitution  just  as  it  was  and  were  called  "Federalists." 

Others,  who  wanted  the  old  Articles  of  Confederation  pre 
served  and  amended  so  as  to  give  Congress  a  revenue  and  only 
a  little  more  power,  opposed  the  Constitution  and  wanted  it 
altered.  To  please  these  "Anti-Federalists,"  as  they  were  a 
large  part  of  the  people,  Congress,  in  1789,  drew  up  twelve 
amendments  to  the  Constitution  and  sent  them  to  the  states. 
With  the  ratification  of  ten  of  these  amendments,  opposition 
to  the  Constitution  ceased.  But  as  soon  as  Congress  began  to 
pass  laws,  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  expediency  of  them, 
and  even  as  to  the  right  of  Congress  to  pass  them,  divided  the 
people  again  into  two  parties,  and  sent  a  good  many  Federalists 
into  the  Anti-Federalist  party. 

A  very  large  number  of  men,  for  instance,  opposed  the  fund 
ing  of  the  Continental  Congress  debt  at  its  face  value,  because 
the  people  never  had  taken  a  bill  at  the  value  expressed  on  its 
face,  but  at  a  very  much  less  value ;  some  opposed  the  assump- 


THE   RISE   OF   PARTIES  203 

tion  of  the  state  debts,  because  Congress,  they  said,  had  power 
to  pay  the  debt  of  the  United  States,  but  not  state  debts ; 
others  opposed  the  National  Bank  because  the  Constitution 
did  not  give  Congress  express  power  in  so  many  words  to 
charter  a  bank.  Others  complained  that  the  interest  on  the 
national  debt  and  the  great  salary  of  the  President  ($25,000  a 
year)  and  the  pay  of  Congressmen  ($6  a  day)  and  the  hundreds 
of  tax  collectors  made  taxes  too  heavy.  They  complained 
again  that  men  in  office  showed  an  undemocratic  fondness 
for  aristocratic  customs.  The  President,  they  said,  was  too 
exclusive,  and  owned  too  fine  a  coach.  The  Justices  of  the 
Supreme  Court  must  have  black  silk  gowns,  with  red,  white, 
and  blue  scarfs.  The  Senate  for  some  years  to  come  held 
its  daily  session  in  secret ;  not  even  a  newspaper  reporter  was 
allowed  to  be  present. 

As  early  as  1792  there  were  thus  a  very  great  number  of 
men  in  all  parts  of  the  country  who  were  much  opposed  to  the 
measures  of  Congress  and  the  President,  and  who  accused  the 
Federalists  of  wishing  to  set  up  a  monarchy.  A  great  national 
debt,  they  said,  a  funding  system,  a  national  bank,  and  heavy 
internal  taxes  are  all  monarchical  institutions,  and  if  you  have 
the  institutions,  it  will  not  be  long  before  you  have  the  mon 
archy.  They  began  therefore  in  1792  to  organize  for  election 
purposes,  and  as  they  were  opposed  to  a  monarchy,  they  called 
themselves  "  Republicans." l  Their  great  leaders  were  Jeffer 
son,  Madison,  Monroe,  John  Randolph,  and  Albert  Gallatin. 
,  226.  The  Whisky  Rebellion,  1794. —One  of  the  taxes  to 
which  the  Republicans  objected,  that  on  whisky,  led  to  the 
first  rebellion  against  the  government  of  the  United  States.  In 
those  days,  1791,  the  farmers  living  in  the  region  around  Pitts- 
burg  could  not  send  grain  or  flour  down  the  Ohio  and  the 
Mississippi,  because  Spain  had  shut  the  Mississippi  to  naviga 
tion  by  Americans.  They  could  not  send  their  flour  over  the 
mountains  to  Philadelphia  or  Baltimore,  because  it  cost  more 
to  haul  it  there  than  it  would  sell  for.  Instead,  therefore,  of 

1  This  party  was  the  forerunner  of  the  present  Democratic  party. 
McM.  HIST. —  12 


204  THE   STRUGGLE   FOR  A   GOVERNMENT 

making  flour,  they  grew  rye  and  made  whisky  on  their  own 
farms.  This  found  a  ready  sale.  Now,  when  the  United  States 
collectors  attempted  to  collect  the  whisky  tax, -the  farmers  of 
western  Pennsylvania  drove  them  away.  An  appeal  was  then 
made  to  the  courts ;  but  when  the  marshal  came  to  make 
arrests  he,  too,  was  driven  away.  Under  the  Articles  of  Con 
federation  this  would  have  been  submitted  to.  But  the  Con 
stitution  and  the  acts  of  Congress  were  now  "the  supreme  law 
of  the  land,"  and  Washington  in  his  oath  of  office  had  sworn 
to  see  them  executed.  •  To  accomplish  this,  he  used  the  power 
given  him  by  an  act  of  Congress,  and  called  out  12,900  militia 
from  the  neighboring  states  and  marched  them  to  Pittsburg. 
Then  the  people  yielded.  Two  of  the  leaders  were  tried  and 
convicted  of  treason ;  but  Washington  pardoned  them. 

The  insurrection  or  rebellion  was  a  small  affair.  But  the 
principles  at  stake  were  great.  It  was  now  shown  that  the 
Constitution  and  the  laws  must  be  obeyed ;  that  it  was  treason 
to  resist  them  by  force,  and  that  if  necessary  the  people  would, 
at  the  call  of  the  President,  turn  out  and  put  down  rebellion 
by  force  of  arms.1 

SUMMARY 

1.  As  soon  as   Washington   was   inaugurated,    Congress  proceeded   to 

organize  the  new  government. 

2.  The  Supreme  Court  and  circuit  and  district  courts  were  established. 

3.  The  departments  of  State,  War,  and  Treasury  were  formed. 

4.  Twelve  amendments  to  the  Constitution  were  proposed. 

5.  Three  financial  measures  were  adopted  : 

A.  A  tariff  act  was  passed. 

B.  The  debts  of  the  states  were  assumed,  and,  with  that  of  the 
Continental  Congress,  funded. 

C.  A  national  bank  was  chartered. 

G.    The  price  of  funding  was  the  ultimate  location  of  the  national  capital 
on  the  Potomac. 

7.  The  first  census  was  taken  in  1790. 

8.  The  result  of  the  financial  measures  of  Congress  was  the  rise  of  the 

Republican  party  (the  forerunner  of  the  present  Democratic  party). 

1  Read  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  II., 
pp.  189-204  ;  Findley's  History  of  the  Insurrection  in  Pennsylvania. 


.THE   RISE    OF   PARTIES 


20/1 


THK  ORIGIN  OF  POLITICAL  PARTIES. 


Funding  the  Continental 

Debt. 

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THE    STRUGGLE    FOR    COMMERCIAL    INDE 
PENDENCE 

CHAPTER   XVI 

THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY 

227.  Trouble  with  Great  Britain  and  France.  — From  the  con 
gressional  election  in  1792  we  may  date  the  beginning  of 
organized  political  parties  in  the  United  States.  They  sprang 
from  differences  of  opinion  as  to  domestic  matters.  But  on  a 
sudden  in  1793  Federalists  and  Republicans  became  divided  on 
questions  of  foreign  affairs. 

Ever  since  1789  France  had  been  in  a  state  of  revolution, 
and  at  last  (in  1792)  the  people  established  the  French  Re 
public,  cut  off  the  heads  of  the  King  and  Queen  (in  1793),  and 
declared  war  on  England  and  sent  a  minister,  Genet,  to  the 
United  States.  At  that  time  we  had  no  treaty  with  Great 
Britain  except  the  treaty  of  peace.  With  France,  however,  we 
had  two  treaties,  —  one  of  alliance,  and  one  of  amity  and  com 
merce.  The  treaty  of  alliance  bound  us  to  guarantee  to  France 
"  the  possessions  of  the  crown  of  France  in  America,"  by  which 
were  meant  the  French  West  Indian  Islands.  When  Washing 
ton  heard  that  war  had  been  declared  by  France,  and  that 
a  French  minister  was  on  his  way  to  America,  he  became 
alarmed  lest  this  minister  should  call  011  him  to  make  good  the 
guarantee  by  sending  a  fleet  to  the  Indies.  On  consulting  his 
secretaries,  they  advised  him  that  the  guarantee  applied  only 
when  France  was  attacked,  and  not  when  she  was  the  attacking 
party.  The  President  thereupon  issued  a  proclamation  of 

206 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY        207 

neutrality ;  that  is,  declared  that  the  United  States  would  not 
side  with  either  party  in  the  war,  but  would  treat  both  alike. 

228.  Sympathy  for  France;   the   French   Craze.  —  Then   be 
gan  a  long  struggle  for  neutrality.     The  Republicans  were  very 
angry  at  Washington  and  denounced  him  violently.     France, 
they  said,  had  been  our  old  friend ;  Great  Britain  had  been  our 
old  enemy.     We  had  a  treaty  with  France ;  we  had  none  with 
Great  Britain.     To  treat  her  on  the  same  footing  with  France 
was  therefore  a  piece  of  base  ingratitude  to  France.     A  wave 
of  sympathy  for  France  swept  over  the  country.     The  French 
dress,  customs,  manners,  came  into  use.     Republicans  ceased 
to    address    each    other    as    Mr.    Smith,   Mr.    Jones,    Sir,    or 
"  Your  Honor,"  and  used  Citizen  Smith  and  Citizen  Jones. 
The  French  tricolor  with  the  red   liberty  cap  was  hung  up 
in   taverns  and   coffeehouses,  which  were   the  clubhouses  of 
that  day.     Every  French  victory  was  made  the  occasion  of 
a  "civic  feast,"  while  the  anniversaries  of  the  fall  of  the 
Bastile  and  of  the  founding  of  the  Republic  were  kept  in  every 
great  city.1 

229.  England  seizes  our  Ships;  the  Rule  of  1756. — To  pre 
serve  neutrality  in  the  face  of  such  a  public  sentiment  was 
hard  enough ;   but  Great  Britain  made  it  more  difficult   yet. 
When  war  was  declared,  France  opened  the  ports  of  her  West 
Indian  Islands  and  invited  neutral  nations  to  trade  with  them. 
This  she  did  because  she  knew  that  the  British  navy  could 
drive   her   merchantmen   from   the   sea,   and   that    all    trade 
between  herself  and  her  colonies  must  be  carried  on  in  the 
ships  of  neutral  nations. 

Now  the  merchants  of  the  United  States  had  never  been 
allowed  to  trade  with  the  French  Indies  to  an  unlimited  ex 
tent.  The  moment,  therefore,  they  were  allowed  to  do  so,  they 
gladly  began  to  trade,  and  during  the  summer  of  1793  hundreds 
of  ships  went  to  the  islands.  There  were  at  that  time  four 
questions  of  dispute  between  us  and  Great  Britain : 

1  Read  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol. 
II.,  pp.  89-96;  Harper's  Magazin*  April,  1897. 


208       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

1.  Great  Britain  held  that  she  might  seize  any  kind  of  food 

going  to  a  French  port  in  our  ships.  We  held  that  only 
military  stores  might  be  so  seized. 

2.  Great  Britain  held  that  when  a  port  had  been  declared  to 

be  blockaded,  a  ship  bound  to  that  port  might  be  seized 
even  on  the  high  seas.  We  held  that  no  port  was  block 
aded  unless  there  was  a  fleet  actually  stationed  at  it  to 
prevent  ships  from  entering  or  leaving  it. 

;>.  Great  Britain  held  that  our  ships  might  be  captured  if  they 
had  French  goods  on  board.  We  held  that  "  free  ships 
made  free  goods,"  and  that  our  ships  were  not  subject  to 
capture,  no  matter  whose  goods  they  had  on  board. 

4.  Great  Britain  in  1756  had  adopted  a  rule  that  no  neutral 
should  have  in  time  of  war  a  trade  she  did  not  have  in 
time  of  peace. 


The  United  States  was  now  enjoying  a  trade  in  time  of  war 
she  did  not  have  in  time  of  peace,  and  Great  Britain  began  toN4—i 
enforce  her  rule.  British  ships  were  ordered  to  stop  American 
vessels  going  to  or  coming  from  the  French  West  Indies,  and 
if  they  contained  provisions,  to  seize  them.  This  was  done, 
and  in  the  autumn  of  179o  great  numbers  of  American  ships 
were  captured. 

230.  Our  Sailors  impressed.  —  All  this  was  bad  enough  and 
excited  the  people  against  our  old  enemy,  who  made  matters  a 
thousand  times  worse  by  a  course  of  action  to  which  we  could 
not  possibly  submit.  She  claimed  the  right  to  stop  any  of  our 
ships  011  the  sea,  send  an  officer  on  board,  force  the  captain  to 
muster  the  crew  on  the  deck,  and  then  search  for  British  sub 
jects.  If  one  was  found,  he  Avas  seized  and  carried  away.  If 
none  were  found,  and  the  British  ships  wanted  men,  native- 
born  Americans  were  taken  off  under  the  pretext  that  one 
could  not  tell  an  American  from  an  English  sailor.  Our 
fathers  could  stand  a  great  deal,  but  this  was  too  much,  and 
a  cry  for  war  went  up  from  all  parts  of  the  country. 

But  Washington  did  not  want  war,  and  took  two  measures 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY 


to  prevent  it.  He  persuaded  Congress  to  lay  an  embargo  for 
thirty  days,  that  is,  forbid  all  'ships  to  leave  our  ports,  and 
induced  the  Senate  to  let  him  send  John  Jay,  the  Chief  Justice, 
to  London  to  make  a  treaty  of  amity  and  commerce  with 
Great  Britain. 

231.  Jay's  Treaty,  1794.  —  In  this  mission  Jay  succeeded; 
and  though  the  treaty  was  far  from  what  Washington  wanted, 
'it  was  the  best  that  could  be  had,  and  he  approved  it.1   At  this 

the  Republicans  grew  furious.  They  burned  copies  of  the 
treaty  at  mass  meetings  and  hung  Jay  in  effigy.  Yet  the 
treaty  had  some  good  features.  By  it  the  King  agreed  to 
withdraw  his  troops  from  Oswego  and  Detroit  and  Mackinaw, 
which  really  belonged  to  us  but  were  still  occupied  by  the 
English.  By  it  our  merchants  were  allowed  for  the  first  time 
to  trade  with  the  British  West  Indies,  and  some  compensation 
was  made  for  the  damage  done  by  the  capture  of  ships  in  the 
West  Indies. 

232.  Treaty  with  Spain.  —  About   the    same  time   (October, 
1795)  we  made  our  first  treaty  with  Spain,  and  induced  her 
to  accept  the  thirty-first  degree  of  latitude  as  the  south  bound 
ary  of  our  country,  and  to  consent  to  open  the  Mississippi  to 
trade.     As  Spain  owned  both  banks  at  the  mouth  of  the  river, 
she  claimed  that  American  ships  had  no  right  to  go  in  or  out 
without  her  consent,  and  so  prevented  the  people  of  Kentucky 
and  Tennessee  from  trading  in  foreign   markets.      She   now 
agreed  that  they  might  float  their  produce  to  New  Orleans  and 
pay  a  small  duty,  and  then  ship  it  wherever  they  pleased. 

233.  The  Election  of  Adams  and  Jefferson,  1796.  —  Washing 
ton  had  been  reflected  President  in  1792,  but  he  was  now  tired 
of  office,  and  in  September,  1796,  issued  his  "Farewell  Address/' 
in  which  he  declined  to  be  the  candidate  for  a  third  presiden 
tial  term.    In  those  days  there  were  no  national  conventions  to 
nominate  candidates,  yet  it  was  well  understood  that  John 
Adams,  the  Vice  President,  was  the  candidate  of  the  Federal 
ists,  and  Thomas  Jefferson,  of  the  Republicans.     When  the 

1  The  Senate  ratified  this  treaty  in  the  summer  of  1795, 


210       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

votes  were  counted  in  Congress,  it  was  found  that  Adams  had 
71  electoral  votes,  and  Jefferson  68 ;  so  they  became  Presi 
dent  and  Vice  President. 

234.    Trouble   with   France.  —  Adams    was   inaugurated    on 
March  4,  1797,  and  three  days  later  heard  that  C.  C.  Pinck- 
ney,  our  minister  to  the  French  Republic,  had  been  driven 
from  France.      Pinckney  had  been  sent  to 
France   by   Washington    in    1796,  but   the 
French  Directory  (as  the  five  men  who  then 
governed    France   were    called)    had  taken 
great  offense  at  Jay's  treaty:  first  because 
it  was  favorable  to  Great  Britain,  and  in  the 
second  place  because  it  put  an  end  for  the 
present  to  all  hope  of  war  between  her  and 
the  United  States.  (The  Directory,  therefore, 
refused  to  receive  Pinckney  until  the  French 
grievances  were  redressed^ 

The  President  was  very  angry  at  the  insult,  and  summoned 
Congress  to  meet  and  take  such  action  as,  said  he,  "  shall  con 
vince  France  and  the  whole  world  that  we  are  not  a  degraded 
people  humiliated  under  a  colonial  spirit  of  fear  and  sense  of 
inferiority."  But  the  Republicans  declared  so  vigorously  that 
if  a  special  mission  were  sent  to  France  all  would  be  made 
right,  that  Adams  yielded,  and  sent  John  Marshall  and 
Elbridge  Gerry  to  join  Pinckney  as  envoys  extraordinary.  On 
reaching  Paris,  three  men  acting  as  agents  for  the  Directory 
met  them,  and  declared  that  before  they  could  be  received  as 
ministers  they  must  do  three  things : 

1 .  Apologize  for  Adams's  denunciation  of  the  conduct  of  France. 

2.  Pay  each  Director  $50,000. 

3.  Pay  tribute  to  France. 

When  the  President  reported  this  demand  to  Congress,  the 
names  of  the  three  French  agents  were  suppressed,  and  instead 
they  were  called  Mr.  X,  Mr.  Y,  Mr.  Z.  This  gave  the  mission 
the  nickname  "X,  Y,  Z  mission." 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY        211 

235.  "Millions  for  Defense,  not  a  Cent  for  Tribute."  —As  the 

newspapers  published  these  dispatches,  a  roar  of  indignation, 
in  which  the  Federalists  and  Republicans  alike  joined,  went 
up  from  the  whole  country.  "  Millions  for  defense,  not  a  cent 
for  tribute,"  became  the  watchword  of  the  hour.  Opposition 
in  Congress  ceased,  and  preparations  were  at  once  made  for 
war.  The  French  treaties  were  suspended.  The  Xavy  De 
partment  was  created,  and  a  Secretary  of  the  Navy  appointed. 
Frigates  were  ordered  to  be  built,  money  was  voted  for  arms, 
a  provisional  army  was  formed,  and  Washington  was  again 
made  commander  in  chief,  with  the  rank  of  lieutenant  general. 
The  young  men  associated  for  defense,  the  people  in  the  sea 
ports  built  frigates  or  sloops  of  war,  and  gave  their  services 
to  erect  forts  and  earthworks.  Every  French  flag  was  now 
pulled  down  from  the  coffeehouses,  and  the  black  cockade 
of  our  own  Revolutionary  days  was  once  more  worn  as 
the  badge  of  patriotism.  Then  was  written,  by  Joseph  Hop- 
kinson  of  Philadelphia,1  and  sung  for  the  first  time,  our 
national  song  Hail,  Columbia  ! 

236.  The  Alien  and  Sedition  Acts.  —  Carried  away  by  the 
excitement  of  the  hour,  the  Federalists  now  passed  two  most 
unwise  laws.     Many  of  the  active  leaders  and  very  many  of 
the  members  of  the  Republican  party  were  men  born  abroad 
and  naturalized  in  this  country.     Generally  they  were   Irish 
men  or  Frenchmen,  and  as  such  had  good  reason  to  hate  Eng 
land,  and  therefore  hated  the  Federalists,  who  they  believed 
were  too  friendly  to  her.      To  prevent  such  becoming  voters, 
and  so  taking  an  active  part  in  politics,  the  Federalists  passed 
a  new  naturalization  law,  which  forbade  any  foreigner  to  become 
an  American  citizen  until  he  had  lived  fourteen  years  in  our 
country.     Lest  this  should  not  be  enough  to  keep  them  quiet, 

1  The  music  to  which  we  sing  Hail,  Columbia !  was  called  The 
President* 8  March,  and  was  played  for  the  first  time  when  the  people 
of  Trenton  were  welcoming  Washington  on  his  way  to  be  inaugurated 
President  in  1789.  For  an  account  of  the  trouble  with  France  read 
McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  II.,  pp. 
207-416,  427-476. 


212       STRUGGLE   FOR  COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

a  second  law  was  passed  by  which,  the  President  had  power  for 
two  years  to  send  any  alien  (any  of  these  men  who  for  fourteen 
years  could  not  become  citizens)  out  of  the  country  whenever 
he  thought  it  proper.  This  law  Adams  never  used. 

For  five  years  past  the  Republican  newspapers  had  been 
abusing  Washington,  Adams,  the  acts  of  Congress,  the  mem 
bers  of  Congress,  and  the  whole  foreign  policy  of  the  Federal 
ists.  The  Federalist  newspapers,  of  course,  had  retaliated 
and  had  been  just  as  abusive  of  the  Republicans.  But  as  the 
Federalists  now  had  the  power,  they  determined  to  punish  the 
Republicans  for  their  abuse,  and  passed  the  Sedition  Act.  This 
provided  that  any  man  who  acted  seditiously  (that  is,  inter 
fered  with  the  execution  of  a  law  of  Congress)  or  spoke  or 
wrote  seditiously  (that  is,  abused  the  President,  or  Congress, 
or  any  member  of  the  Federal  government)  should  be  tried, 
and  if  found  guilty,  be  fined  and  imprisoned.  This  law  was 
used,  and  used  vigorously,  and  Republican  editors  all  over  the 
country  were  fined  and  sometimes  imprisoned.1 

237.  Virginia  and  Kentucky  Resolutions.  —  The  passage  of 
these  Alien  and  Sedition  laws  greatly  excited  the  Republicans, 
and  led  Jefferson  to  use  his  influence  to  have  them  condemned 
by  the  states.  For  this  purpose  he  wrote  a  set  of  resolutions 
and  sent  them  to  a  friend  in  Kentucky  who  was  to  try  to  have 
the  legislature  adopt  them.2  Jefferson  next  asked  Madison  to 
write  a  like  set  of  resolutions  for  the  Virginia  legislature  to 
adopt.  Madison  became  so  interested  that  he  gave  up  his  seat 
in  Congress  and  entered  the  Virginia  legislature,  and  in  Decem 
ber,  1798,  induced  it  to  adopt  what  have  since  been  known  as 
the  Virginia  Resolutions  of  1798. 

Meantime  the  legislature  of  Kentucky,  November,  1798,  had 
adopted  the  resolutions  of  Jefferson.3 

1  The  Alien  and  Sedition  acts  are  in  Preston's  Documents,  pp.  277-282. 

2  Kentucky  had  been  admitted  to  the  Union  in  1792  (see  p.  243). 

8  E.  I).  Warfield's  Virginia  and  Kentucky  Resolutions.  The  Resolu 
tions  are  printed  in  Preston's  Documents,  pp.  283-298  ;  Jefferson's  Works, 
Vol.  IX.,  p.  494. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY        213 

Both  sets  declare  1.  That  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  is  a  compact  or  contact.'  2.  That  to  this  contract  each 
state  is  a  party  ;  that  is,  the  united  states  are  equal  partners 
in  a  great  political  firm.  So  far  they  agree ;  but  at  this  point 
they  differ.  The  Kentucky  Resolutions  assert  that  when  any 
question  arises  as  to  the  right  of  Congress  to  pass  any  law,  each 
state  may  decide  this  question  for  itself  and  apply  any  remedy 
it  likes.  The  Virginia  Resolutions  declare  that  the  states  may 
judge  and  apply  the  remedy. 

Both  declared  that  the  Alien  and  Sedition  laws  were  wholly 
unconstitutional.  Seven  states  answered  by  declaring  that 
the  laws  were  constitutional,  whereupon  Kentucky  in  1799 
framed  another  set  of  resolutions  in  wilich  she  said  that  when 
a  state  thought  a  law  to  be  illegal  she  had  the  right  to  nullify 
it ;  that  is,  forbid  her  citizens  to  obey  it.  This  doctrine  of 
nullification,  as  we  shall  see,  afterwards  became  of  very  serious 
importance.1 

238.  The  Naval  War  with  France. — Meantime  war  opened 
with  France.  The  Xavy  Department  was  created  in  April, 
1798,  and  before  the  year  ended,  a  gallant  little  navy  of  thirty- 
four  frigates,  corvettes,  and  gun  sloops  of  war  had  been  col 
lected  and  sent  with  a  host  of  privateers  to  scour  the  sea 
around  the  French  West  Indies,  destroy  French  commerce, 
and  capture  French  ships  of  war.2  One  of  our  frigates,  the 
Constellation,  Captain  Thomas  Truxton  in  command,  captured 
the  French  frigate  Insurgente,  after  a  gallant  fight.  On  another 
occasion,  Truxton,  in  the  Constellation,  fought  the  Vengeance, 
and  would  have  taken  her,  but  the  Frenchman,  finding  he  was 
getting  much  the  worst  of  it,  spread  his  sails  and  fled.  Yet 
another  of  our  frigates,  the  Boston,  took  the  Berceau,  whose  flag 
is  now  in  the  Naval  Institute  Building  at  Annapolis.  In  six 
months  the  little  American  twelve-gun  schooner  Enterprise  took 

1  The  answers  of  the  states  are  printed  in  Elliot's  Debates,  Vol.  IV., 
pp.  5:^-539. 

2  For  an  account  of  this  war,  read   Maclay's  History  of  the   United 
States  Navy,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  155-213. 


214      STRUGGLE  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 

eight  French  privateers,  and  recaptured  and  set  free  four  Ameri 
can  merchantmen.  These  and  a  hundred  other  actions  just  as 
gallant  made  good  the  patriotic  words  of  John  Adams,  "  that 
we  are  not  a  degraded  people  humiliated  under  a  colonial 
spirit  of  fear  and  sense  of  inferiority."  So  impressed  was 
France  with  this  fact  that  the  war  had  scarcely  begun  when 
the  Directory  meekly  sent  word  that  if  another  set  of  ministers 
came  they  would  be  received.  They  ought  to  have  been  told 
that  they  must  send  a  mission  to  us.  But  Adams  in  this  re 
spect  was  weak,  and  in  1800,  the  Chief  Justice,  Oliver  Ells 
worth,  William  R.  Davie,  and  William  Vans  Murray  were  sent 
to  Paris.  The  Directory  had  then  fallen  from  power,  Napoleon 
was  ruling  France  as  First  Consul,  and  with  him  in  September, 
1800,  a  convention  was  concluded. 

239.  The  Stamp  Tax ;  the  Direct  Tax  and  Fries's  Rebellion,  1798. 
-  The  heavy  cost  of  the  preparations  for  war  made  new  taxes 

necessary.  Two  of  these,  a  stamp  tax  very  similar  to  the 
famous  one  of  1765,  and  a  direct  tax,  greatly  excited  the 
people.  The  direct  tax  was  the  first  of  its  kind  in  our  history, 
and  was  laid  on  lands,  houses,  and  negro  slaves.  In  certain  coun 
ties  of  eastern  Pennsylvania,  where  the  population  was  chiefly 
German,  the  purpose  of  the  tax  was  not  understood,  and  the 
people  refused  to  make  returns  of  the  value  of  their  farms 
and  houses.  When  the  assessors  came  to  measure  the  houses 
and  count  the  windows  as  a  means  of  determining  the  value 
of  the  property,  the  people  drove  them  off.  For  this  some  of 
the  leaders  were  arrested.  But  the  people  under  John  Fries 
rose  and  rescued  the  prisoners.  At  this  stage  President 
Adams  called  out  the  militia,  and  marched  it  against  the  rebels. 
They  yielded.  But  Fries  was  tried  for  treason,  was  sentenced 
to  be  hanged,  and  was  then  pardoned.  Thus  a  second  time 
was  it  proved  that  the  people  of  the  United  States  were  deter 
mined  to  support  the  Constitution  and  the  laws  and  put  down 
rebellion. 

240.  Washington  the  National  Capital.  —  In  accordance  with 
the  bargain  made  in  1790,  AVashington  selected  a  site  for  the 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY        215 

Federal  city  on  both  banks  of  the  Potomac.  This  great  square 
tract  of  land  was  ten  miles  long  on  each  side,  and  was  given  to 
the  government  partly  by  Maryland  and  partly  by  Virginia.1 
It  was  called  the  District  of  Columbia,  and  in  it  were  marked 
out  the  streets  of  Washington  city. 

Though  all  possible  haste  was  made,  the  President's  house 
was  still  unfinished,  the  Capitol  but  partly  built,  and  the 
streets  nothing  but  roads  cut  through  the  woods,  when,  in  the 
summer  of  1800,  the  secretaries,  the  clerks,  the  books  and 
papers  of  the  government  left  Philadelphia  for  Washington. 
With  the  opening  of  the  new  century,  and  the  occupation  of 


The  National  Capitol  as  it  was  in  1825 

the  new  Capitol,  came  a  new  President,  and  a  new  party  in 
control  of  the  government. 

241.  The  Election  of  Thomas  Jefferson.  —  The  year  1800 
was  a  presidential  year,  and  though  no  formal  nomination 
was  made,  a  caucus  of  Republican  leaders  selected  as  can 
didates  Thomas  Jefferson  for  President,  and  Aaron  Burr  for 
Vice  President.  A  caucus  or  meeting  of  Federalist  leaders 
selected  John  Adams  and  C.  C.  Pinckney  as  their  candidates. 
When  the  returns  were  all  in,  it  appeared  that  Jefferson 
had  received  seventy-three  votes,  Burr  seventy-three  votes, 
Adams  sixty-five  votes,  Pinckney  sixty-four  votes.  The  Con 
stitution  provided  that  the  man  who  received  the  highest 

1  In  1846  so  much  of  the  District  as  had  belonged  to  Virginia  was 
given  back  to  her. 


216       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

number  of  electoral  votes,  if  the  choice  of  the  majority  of  the 
electors,  should  be  President.  But  as  Jefferson  and  Burr  had 
each  seventy-three,  neither  had  the  highest,  and  neither  was 
President.  The  duty  of  electing  a  President  then  devolved  on 
the  House  of  Representatives,  which  after  a  long  and  bitter 
struggle  elected  Jefferson  President ;  Burr  then  became  Vice 
President.  To  prevent  such  a  contest  ever  arising  again,  the 
twelfth  amendment  was  added  to  the  Constitution.  This  pro 
vides  for  a  separate  ballot  for  Vice  President.  March  4,  1801, 
Jefferson,  escorted  by  the  militia  of  Georgetown  and  Alexan 
dria,  walked  from  his  lodgings  to  the  Senate  chamber  and  took 
the  oath  of  office.1  He  and  his  party  had  been  placed  in 
power  in  order  to  make  certain  reforms,  and  this,  when  Con 
gress  met  in  the  winter  of_1801,  they  began  to  do. 

242.  The  Annual  Message. — While  Washington  and  Adams 
were  presidents,  it  was  their  custom  when  Congress  met  each 
year  to  go  in  state  to  the  House  of  Representatives,  and  in  the 
presence  of  the  House  and  Senate  read  a  speech.     The  two 
branches  of  Congress  would  then  separate  and  appoint  com 
mittees    to   answer   the    President's    speech,    and   when    the 
answers  were  ready,  each  would  march  through   the  streets 
to   the   President's   house,  where  the  Vice  President   or   the 
Speaker  would  read  the  answer  to  the  President.     When  Con 
gress  met  in  1801,  Jefferson  dropped  this  custom  and  sent 
a  written  message  to  both  houses  —  a  practice  which   every 
President  since  that  time  has  followed. 

243.  Republican  Reforms.  —  True  to  their  promises,  the  Re 
publicans  now   proceeded  to   repeal  the   hated   laws   of  the 
Federalists.      They  sold  all    the  ships  of  the    navy    except 
thirteen,  they  ordered  prosecutions  under  the  Sedition  law  to 
be  stopped,  they  repealed  all  the  internal  taxes  laid  by  the 

1  For  a  fine  description  of  Jefferson's  personality,  read  Henry  Adams's 
History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  185-191.  As  to  the  story  of 
Jefferson  riding  alone  to  the  Capitol  and  tying  his  horse  to  the  fence, 
see  Adams's  History,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  196-199;  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  II., 
pp.  533-534. 


•^i 


218       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL    INDEPENDENCE 

Federalists,  they  cut  down  the  army  to  2500  men,  and  reduced 
the  expenses  of  government  to  $3,700,000  per  year  —  a  sum 
which  would  not  now  pay  the  cost  of  running  the  government 
for  three  days.  As  the  annual  revenue  collected  at  the  custom 
houses,  the  post  office,  and  from  the  sale  of  land  was  $10,800,000, 
the  treasury  had  some  $7,000,000  of  surplus  each  year.  This 
was  used  to  pay  the  national  debt,  which  fell  from  $83,000,000 
in  1801  to  $45,000,000  in  1812,  and  this  in  spite  of  the  pur 
chase  of  Louisiana. 

244.  The  Purchase  of  Louisiana.  —  When  France  was  driven 
out  of  America,  it  will  be  remembered,  she  gave  to  Spain  all  of 
Louisiana  west  of  the  Mississippi  Kiver,  together  with  a  large 
tract  on  the  east  bank,  at  the  river's  mouth.  Spain  then 
owned  Louisiana  till  1800,  when  by  a. secret  treaty  she  gave 
the  province  back  to  France.1 

For  a  while  this  treaty  was  really  kept  secret ;  but  in  April, 
1802,  news  that  Louisiana  had  been  given  to  France  and  that 
Napoleon  was  going  to  send  out  troops  to  hold  it,  reached  this 
country  and  produced  two  consequences.  In  the  first  place, 
it  led  the  Spanish  iiitendant  (as  the  man  who  had  charge  of 
all  commercial  matters  was  called)  to  withdraw  the  "  right  of 
deposit "  at  New  Orleans,  and  so  prevent  citizens  of  the  United 
States  sending  their  produce  out  of  the  Mississippi  Kiver. 
In  the  second  place,  this  act  of  the  intendant  excited  the  rage 
of  all  the  settlers  in  the  valley  from  Pittsburg  to  Natchez, 
and  made  them  demand  the  instant  seizure  of  New  Orleans 
by  American  troops.  To  prevent  this,  Jefferson  obtained  the 
consent  of  Congress  to  make  an  effort  to  buy  New  Orleans  and 
West  Florida,  and  sent  Monroe  to  aid  our  minister  in  France 
in  making  the  purchase. 

When  the  offer  was  made,  Napoleon  was  about  going  to  war 
with  England,  and,  wanting  money  very  much,  he  in  turn  offered 
to  sell  the  whole  province  to  the  United  States  —  an  offer  that 
was  gladly  accepted.  The  price  paid  was  $15,000,000,  and  in 
December,  1803,  Louisiana  was  formally  delivered  to  us. 
i  Adams's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  362-576. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY 

245.  Louisiana.  —  Concerning  this  splendid  domain  hardly 
anything  was  known.    No  boundaries  were  given  to  it  either  on 
the  north,  or  on  the  west,  or  on  the  south.     What  the  country 
was  like  nobody  could  tell.1    Where  the  source  of  the  Missis 
sippi  was  no  white  man  knew.     In  the  time  of    La  Salle  a 
priest  named  Hennepin  had  gone  up  to  the  spot  where  Minne 
apolis  now  stands,  and  had  seen  the  Falls  of  St.   Anthony 
(p.  63).     But  the  country  above  the  falls  was  still  unknown. 

246.  Explorations    of   Lewis    and   Clark.  —  That   this   great 
region  ought  to  be  explored  had  been  a  favorite  idea  of  Jef 
ferson  for  twenty  years  past,  and  he  had  tried  to  persuade 
learned  men  and  learned  societies  to  organize  an  expedition  to 
cross  the  continent.     Failing  in  this,  he  turned  to  Congress, 
which  in  1803  (before  the  purchase  of  Louisiana)  voted  a  sum 
of  money  for  sending  an  exploring  party  from  the  mouth  of 
the  Missouri  to  the  Pacific.     The  party  was  in  charge  of  Meri- 
wether  Lewis  and  William  Clark.     Early  in  May,  1804,  they 
left  St.  Louis,  then  a  frontier  town  of  log  cabins,  and  worked 
their  way  up  the  Missouri  River  to  a  spot  not  far  from  the 
present  city  of  Bismarck,  North  Dakota,  where  they  passed 
the  winter  with  the  Indians.     Resuming  their  journey  in  the 
spring  of  1805,  they  followed  the  Missouri  to  its  source  in  the 
mountains,  after  crossing  which  they  came  to  the  Clear  Water 
River ;  and  down  this  they  went  to  the  Columbia,  which  carried 
them  to  a  spot  where,  late  in  November,  1805,  they  "  saw  the 
waves  like  small  mountains  rolling  out  in  the  sea."     They 
were  on  the  shores  of  the  Pacific  Ocean.     After  spending  the 
winter  at  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia,  the  party  made  its  way 
back  to  St.  Louis  in  1806. 

247.  The  Oregon  Country.  —  Lewis  and  Clark  were  not  the 
first  of  our  countrymen  to  see  the  Columbia  River.     In  1792  a 

1  In  a  description  of  it  which  Jefferson  sent  to  Congress  in  1804,  he 
actually  stated  that  "  there  exists  about  one  thousand  miles  up  the  Mis 
souri,  and  not  far  from  that  river,  a  salt  mountain.  This  mountain  is 
said  to  be  one  hundred  and  eighty  miles  long  and  forty-five  in  width, 
composed  of  solid  rock  salt,  without  any  trees  or  even  shrubs  on  it." 
McM.  HIST.  — 13 


220       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 


Boston  ship  captain  named  Gray  was  trading  with  the  Pacific 
coast  Indians.  He  was  collecting  furs  to  take  to  China  and 
exchange  for  tea  to  be  carried  to  Boston,  and  while  so  engaged 
he  discovered  the  mouth  of  a  great  river,  which  he  entered, 

and  named  the  Co 
lumbia  in  honor  of 
his  ship.  By  right 
of  this  discovery  by 
Gray  the  United 
States  was  entitled 
to  all  the  country 
drained  by  the  Co 
lumbia  Eiver.  By 
the  exploration  of 
this  country  by 
Lewis  and  Clark 
our  title  was  made 
stronger  still,  and  it 
was  finally  perfected 

a  few  years  later  when  the  trappers  and  settlers  went  over 
the  Rocky  Mountains  and  occupied  the  Oregon  country.1 

248.  Pike  explores  the  Southwest.  — While  Lewis  and  Clark 
were  making  their  way  up  the  Missouri,  Zebulon  Pike  was 
sent  to  find  the  source  of  the  Mississippi,  which  he  thought 
he  did  in  the  winter  of  1805-06.  In  this  he  was  mistaken,  but 
supposing  his  work  done,  he  was  dispatched  on  another  expe 
dition  in  1806.  Traveling  up  the  Missouri  Kiver  to  the 
Osage,  and  up  the  Osage  nearly  to  its  source,  he  struck  across 
Kansas  to  the  Arkansas  Eiver,  which  he  followed  to  its  head 
waters,  wandering  in  the  neighborhood  of  that  fine  mountain 
which  in  honor  of  him  bears  the  name  of  Pikes  Peak.  Then 
he  crossed  the  mountains  and  began  a  search  for  the  Eed 
Eiver.  The  march  was  a  terrible  one.  It  was  winter;  the 
cold  was  intense.  The  snow  lay  waist  deep  on  the  plains. 
Often  the  little  band  was  without  food  for  two  days  at  a  time. 
1  Barrows's  Oregon  ;  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  633-635. 


Month  of  Columbia  River 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY 


221 


But  Pike  pushed  on,  in  spite  of  hunger,  cold,  and  suffering,  and 
at  last  saw,  through  a  gap  in  the  mountains,  the  waters  of  the 
Rio  Grande.  Believing  that  it  was  the  Ked,  he  hurried  to 
its  banks,  only  to  be  seized  by  the  Spaniards  (for  he  was  on 
Spanish  soil),  who  carried  him  a  prisoner  to  Santa  Fe,  from 
which  city  he  and  his  men  wandered  back  to  the  United  States 
by  way  of  Mexico  and  Texas. 


249.  Astoria  founded.  —  The  immediate  effect  of  these  ex 
plorations  was  greatly  to  stimulate  the  fur  trade.  One  great 
fur  trader,  John  Jacob  Astor  of  New  York,  now  founded  the 
Pacific  Fur  Company  and  made  preparations  to  establish  a  line 
of  posts  from  the  upper  Missouri  to  the  Columbia,  and  along 
it  to  the  Pacific,  and  supply  them  from  St.  Louis  by  way  of  the 
Missouri,  or  from  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia,  where  in  1811  a 
little  trading  post  was  begun  and  named  Astoria.  This  com 
pleted  our  claim  to  the  Oregon  country.  Gray  had  discovered 
the  river ;  Lewis  and  Clark  had  explored  the  territory  drained 
by  the  river ;  the  Pacific  Fur  Company  planted  the  first  lasting 
settlement. 


222       STRUGGLE  FOB  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 


SUMMARY 

1.  In  1793  France  made  war  on  Great  Britain.    The  United  States  was 

bound  by  the  treaty  of  alliance  of  1778  to  "guarantee "  the  .French 
possessions  in  America. 

2.  This  treaty,  and  the  coming  of  the  French  minister,  forced  Washing 

ton  to  declare  the  United  States  neutral  in  the  war. 

3.  His  proclamation  of  neutrality  was  resented  by  the  Republicans,  who 

now  became  sympathizers  with  France.  The  Federalists,  who 
were  strongest  in  the  commercial  states,  became  the  anti-French 
or  English  party. 

4.  When  France  declared  war  on  England,  she  opened  her  ports  in  the 

West  Indies  to  the  merchant  trade  of  the  United  States. 
6.    England  held  that  we  should  not  have  a  trade  with  France  when  at 
war,  for  we  had  not  had  it  when  France  was  at  peace.    This  was 
an  application1  of  the  "Rule  of  1756."     In  1793-1794,  therefore, 
England  began  to  seize  our  ships  coming  from  the  French  ports. 

6.  This  so  excited  the  Republicans  that  they  attempted  to  force  the 

country  into  war  with  England. 

7.  To  prevent  war, -Washington  sent  Jay  to  London,  where  he  made  our 

first  commercial  treaty  with  Great  Britain. 

8.  This  offended  the  French  Directory,  who  refused  to  receive  our  new 

minister  and  sent  him  out  of  France. 

9.  War  with  France  now  seemed  likely.     But  Adams,  in  the  interest  of 

peace,  sent  three  commissioners  to  Paris  to  make  a  new  treaty. 
They  were  met  with  demands  for  tribute  and  came  home. 

10.  The  greatest  excitement  now  prevailed  in  the  country.      The  Navy 

Department  was  created,  a  navy  was  built  by  the  people,  and  a 
provisional  army  raised.  The  old  French  treaties  were  suspended, 
and  a  naval  war  began. 

11.  The  popular  anger  against  the  Republicans  (the  French  party)  gave 

the  Federalists  control  of  Congress,  whereupon  they  passed  the 
Alien  and  Sedition  laws. 

12.  Against  these  Virginia  and  Kentucky  protested  in  a  set  of  resolutions. 

13.  In  the  election  of  1800  the  Federalists  were  defeated,  and  the  Repub 

licans  secured  control  of  the  Federal  government. 

14.  In  1800  Spain  ceded  Louisiana  to  France,  whereupon  the  Spanish 

official  at  New  Orleans  shut  the  Mississippi  to  American  commerce. 

15.  The  whole  West  cried  out  against  this  and  demanded  war.     But 

Jefferson  offered  to  buy  West  Florida  from  France.  Napoleon 
thereupon  offered  to  sell  all  Louisiana,  and  we  bought  it  (1803). 

16.  The  new  territory  as  yet  had  no  boundaries  ;  but  it  was  explored  in 

the  northwest  by  Lewis  and  Clark,  and  in  the  southwest  by  Pike. 

17.  The  discovery  of  the  Columbia  River  in  1792,  the  exploration  of  the 

country  by  Lewis  and  Clark,  and  the  founding  of  Astoria  estab 
lished  our  claim  to  the  Oregon  country. 


THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NEUTRALITY 


223 


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CHAPTER   XVII 

STRUGGLE  FOR   "FREE   TRADE   AND   SAILORS'   RIGHTS" 

250.    France  and  Great  Britain  renew  the  War.  —  The  war 

between  France  and  Great  Britain,  which  had  been  the  cause 
of  the  sale  of  Louisiana  to  us,  began  in  May,  1803.  The 
United  States  became  again  a  neutral  power,  but,  as  in  1793, 
was  soon  once  more  involved  in  the  disputes  of  France. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  previous  war,  Great  Britain  had  so 
changed  her  ideas  of  neutrality  that  the  merchants  of  the 
United  States,  according  to  her  rules, 

1.  Could  trade  directly  between  a  port  of  the  United  States 

and  the  ports  of  the  French  West  Indies. 

2.  Could  trade  directly  between  the  United  States  and  ports 

in  France  or  Europe. 

3.  But  could  not  trade  directly  between  a  French  West  India 

island  and  France,  or  a  Spanish  West  India  island  and 
Spain,  or  a  Dutch  colony  and  Holland. 

To  evade  this  last  restriction,  by  combining  the  voyages 
allowed  in  numbers  1  and  2,  was  easy.  A  merchant  had  but 
to  load  his  ship  at  New  York  or  Philadelphia,  go  to  some  port 
in  the  French  West  Indies,  take  on  a  new  cargo  and  bring  it 
to  Savannah,  enter  it  at  the  customhouse  and  pay  the  import 
duties.  This  voyage  was  covered  by  number  1.  He  could 
then,  without  disturbing  his  cargo  in  the  least,  clear  his  vessel 
for  France,  and  get  back  from  the  collector  of  customs  all  the 
duty  he  had  paid  except  three  per  cent.  He  was  now  export 
ing  goods  from  the  United  States  and  was  protected  by  num 
ber  2.  This  was  called  "the  broken  voyage,"  and  by  using  it 

224 


"FREE   TRADE  AND   SAILORS1    RIGHTS'*  225 

thousands  of  shipowners  were  enabled  to  carry  goods  back  and 
forth  between  France  and  her  colonies,  by  merely  stopping 
a  few  hours  at  an  American  port  to  clear  for  Europe.  So  uni 
versal  was  this  practice  that  in  1804  the  customs  revenue  rose 
from  $16,000,000  to  $20,000,000. 

In  May,  1805,  however,  the  British  High  Court  of 
Admiralty  decided  that  goods  which  started  from  the  French 
colonies  in  American  ships  and  were  on  their  way  to  France 
could  be  captured  even  if  they  had  been  landed  and  reshipped 
in  the  United  States.  The  moment  that  decision  was  made, 
the  old  trouble  began  again.  British  frigates  were  stationed 
off  the  ports  of  New  York  and  Hampton  Roads,  and  vessels 
coming  in  and  going  out  were  stopped,  searched,  and  their 
sailors  impressed.  Before  1805  ended,  116  of  our  ships  had 
been  seized  and  1000  of  our  sailors  impressed. 

251.  Orders    in    Council,     1806.  —  In    1806    matters    grew 
worse.      Napoleon  was  master  of  Europe,   and  in   order   to 
injure  Great  Britain  he  cut  off  her  trade  with  the  continent. 
For  this  she  retaliated  by  issuing,   in  May,  1806,  an  Order 
in  Council,  which  declared  the  whole  coast  of  Europe,  from 
Brest  to  the  mouth  of  the  river  Elbe,  to  be  blockaded.     This 
was  a  mere  "  paper  blockade  " ;  that  is,  no  fleets  were  off  the 
coast  to  keep  neutrals  from  running  into  the  blockaded  ports. 
Yet  American  vessels  were  captured  at  sea  because  they  were 
going  to  those  ports. 

252.  The  Berlin  Decree. — Napoleon  waited  to  retaliate  till 
November,  1806,  when  he  issued  the  Berlin  Decree,1  declaring 
the  British  Islands  to  be  blockaded. 

253.  Orders  in  Council,  1807.  —  Great  Britain  felt  that  every 
time  Napoleon  struck  at  her  she  must  strike  back  at  him,  and 
in  January,  1807,  a  new  Order  in  Council  forbade  neutrals 
to  trade  from  one  European  port  to  another,   if   both  were 
in  the  possession  of  France  or  her  allies.     Finding  it  had  no 
effect,  she  followed  it  up  with  another  Order  in  Council  in 
November,  1807,  which  declared  that  every  port  on  the  face 

1  So  called  because  he  was  at  Berlin  when  he  issued  it, 


226       STRUGGLE  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 

of  the  earth  from  which  for  any  reason  British  ships  were 
excluded  was  shut  to  neutrals,  unless  they  first  stopped  at 
some  British  port  and  obtained  a  license  to  trade. 

254.  The  Milan  Decree,  1807.  — It  was  now  Napoleon's  turn 
to  strike,  which  he  did  in  December,  1807,  by  issuing  the  Milan 
Decree.1     Thenceforth  any  ship  that  submitted  to  be  searched 
by  British  cruisers  'or  took  out  a  British  license,  or  entered 
any  port  from  which  French  ships  were  excluded,  was  to  be 
captured  wherever  found. 

As  a  result  of  this  series  of  French  Decrees  and  British 
Orders  in  Council,2  the  English  took  194  of  our  ships,  and  the 
French  almost  as  many. 

255.  Jefferson's  Policy;  Non-importation  Act.  —  The  policy  by 
which  Jefferson  proposed  to  meet  this  emergency  consisted  of 
three  parts : 

1.  Lay  up  the  frigates  and  defend  our  coast  and  harbors  by 

a  number  of  small,  swift-sailing  craft,  each  carrying  one 
gun  in  the  stern.  In  time  of  peace  they  were  to  be 
hauled  up  under  sheds.  In  time  of  war  they  were  to 
be  shoved  into  the  water  and  manned  by  volunteers. 
Between  1806  and  1812,  176  of  these  gunboats  were 
built. 

2.  Make  a  new  treaty  with  Great  Britain,  because  that  made 

by  Jay  in  1794  was  to  expire  in  1806.  Under  the  in 
structions  of  Jefferson,  therefore,  Monroe  and  Pinckney 
signed  a  new  treaty  in  December,  1806.  But  it  said 
nothing  about  the  impressment  of  our  sailors,  or  about 
the  right  of  our  ships  to  go  where  they  pleased,  and 
was  so  bad  in  general  that  Jefferson  would  not  even 
send  it  to  the  Senate.3 

1  So  called  because  he  was  in  Milan  at  the  time,  and  dated  it  from  that 
city. 

2  On  the  Orders  in  Council  and  French  Decrees,  read  Adams's  History 
of  the   United  States,  Vol.  III.,  Chap.  16  ;  Vol.  IV.,  Chaps.  4,  5,  and  6; 
McMaster's  History,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  219-223;  249-250;  272-274. 

8  No  treaty  can  become  a  law  unless  approved  by  the  President  and 
two  thirds  of  the  Senate, 


•TREE   TRADE   AND   SAILORS'   RIGHTS"  227 

3.  The  third  part  of  his  policy  consisted  in  doing  what  we 
should  call  "boycotting."  He  wanted  a  law  which 
would  forbid  the  importation  into  the  United  States  of 
any  article  made,  grown,  or  produced  in  Great  Britain 
or  any  of  her  colonies.  Congress  accordingly,  in  April, 
1806,  passed  what  was  called  a  " Non-importation  Act," 
which  prohibited  not  the  importation  of  every  sort  of 
British  goods,  wares,  and  merchandise,  but  only  a  few 
which  the  people  could  make  in  this  country;  as  paper, 
cards,  leather  goods,  etc.  This  was  to  go  into  force  at 
the  President's  pleasure. 

256.  The  Chesapeake  and  the  Leopard Such  an  attempt  to 

punish  Great  Britain  by  cutting  off  a  part  of  her  trade  was 
useless,  and  only  made  her  more  insolent  than  before.  In 
deed,  just  a  week  after  the  President  signed  the  non-importa 
tion  bill,  as  one  of  our  coasting  vessels  was  entering  the  harbor 
of  New  York,  a  British  vessel,  wishing  to  stop  and  search  her, 
fired  a  shot  which  struck  the  helmsman  and  killed  him  at  the 
wheel. 

About  a  year  later,  June,  1807,  an  attack  more  outrageous 
still  was  made  on  our  frigate  Chesapeake.  She  was  on  her 
way  from  Washington  to  the  Mediterranean,  and  was  still  in 
sight  of  land  when  a  British  vessel,  the  Leopard,  hailed  and 
stopped  her  and  sent  an  officer  on  board  with  a  demand  for 
the  delivery  of  deserters  from  the  English  navy.  The  captain 
of  the  Chesapeake  refused,  the  officer  returned,  and  the  Leop 
ard  opened  fire.  To  return  the  fire  was  impossible,  for  only 
a  few  of  the  guns  of  the  Chesapeake  were  mounted.  At  last 
one  was  discharged,  and  as  by  that  time  three  men  had  been 
killed  and  eighteen  wounded,  Commander  Barron  of  the  Chesa 
peake  surrendered.  Four  men  then  were  taken  from  her  deck. 
Three  were  Americans.  One  was  an  Englishman,  and  he  was 
hanged  for  desertion.1 

1  Maclay's  History  of  the  Navy,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  305-308  ;  McMaster's 
History,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  255-259. 


228       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 

257.  The   Long   Embargo.  —  The  attack  on  the  Chesapeake 
ought  to  have  been  followed  by  war.     But  Jefferson  merely 
demanded  reparation  from  Great  Britain,  and  when  Congress' 
met  in  December,  1807,  asked  for  an  embargo.     The  request 
was  granted,  and  merchant  vessels  in  all  the  ports  of  the 
United  States  were  forbidden  to  sail  for  a  foreign  country  till 
the  President  saw  fit  to  suspend  the  law.    The  restriction  was 
so  sweeping  and  the  damage  done  to  American  farmers,  mer 
chants,  and  shipowners  so  great,  that  the  people  began  to  evade 
it  at  once.     They  would  send  their  vessels  to  New  Orleans 
and  stop  at  the  West  Indies  on  the  way.     They  would  send 
their  flour,  pork,  rice,  and  lumber  to  St.  Marys  in  Georgia  and 
smuggle  it  over  the  river  to  Florida,  or  take  it  to  the  islands 
near  Eastport  in  Maine  and  then  smuggle  it  into  New  Bruns 
wick.     Because  of  this,  more  stringent  embargo  laws  were 
passed,  and  finally,  in  1809,  a  "Force  Act,"  to  compel  obedi 
ence.     But  smuggling  went  on  so  openly  that  there  was  noth 
ing  to  do  but  use  troops  or  lift  the  embargo.     In  February, 
1809,  accordingly,  the  embargo  laws,  after  fourteen  months' 
duration,  were  repealed.     Instead  of  them  the  Republicans 
enacted  a  Non-intercourse  law  which  allowed  the  people  to 
trade  with  all  nations  except  England  and  France.1 

258.  Jefferson  refuses  a  Third  Term.  — During  180G,  the  states 
of  New  Jersey,  Vermont,2  Pennsylvania,  New  York,  Rhode 
Island,  Maryland,  Georgia,  and  North  Carolina  invited  Jef 
ferson  to  be  President  a  third  time.     For  a  while  he  made  no 
reply,  but   in   December,   1807,   he  declined,  and  gave   this 
reason :  "  That  I  should  lay  down  my  charge  at  a  proper  period 
is  as  much  a  duty  as  to  have  borne  it  faithfully.     If  some  ter 
mination  to  the  services  of  the  Chief  Magistrate  be  not  fixed  b}~ 
the  Constitution,  or  supplied  by  practice,  his  office,  nominally 
four  years,  will  in  fact  become  for  life ;  and  history  shows  how 
easily  that  degenerates  into  an  inheritance."    This  wise  answer 

1  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  279-338  ;  Adams's  History,  Vol. 
IV.,  Chaps.  7,  11,  13,  15. 

?  Vermont  was  admitted  into  the  Union  in  1791  (p.  243). 


"FREE   TRADE   AND   SAILORS'    RIGHTS"  229 

was  heartily  approved  by  the  people  all  over  the  country,  and 
with  Washington's  similar  action  established  a  custom  which 
has  been  generally  followed  ever  since. 

As  Jefferson  would  not  accept  a  third  term,  a  caucus  of 
Republican  members  of  Congress  met  one  evening  at  the 
Capitol  in  Washington  and  nominated  James 
Madison  and  George  Clinton.  The  Federal 
ists  held  no  caucus,  but  agreed  among  them 
selves  to  support  C.  C.  Pinckney  and  Bufus 
King.  Madison  and  Clinton  were  easily 
elected,  and  were  sworn  into  office  March  4, 
1809. 

259.  The  Macon  Bill ;    Non-intercourse.  — 
When  Congress  met  in  1809  one  more  effort 
was  made  to  force  France  and  England  to 

respect  our  rights  on  the  sea.  Non-importation  had  failed.- 
The  embargo  had  failed.  Non-intercourse  had  failed^,  and 
now  in  desperation  they  passed  a  law  which  at  the  time  was 
called  the  "Macon  Bill,"  from  the  member  of  Congress  who 
introduced  it.  This  restored  trade  with  France  and  England, 
but  declared  that  if  either  would  withdraw  its  Decrees  or 
Orders,  the  United  States  would  stop  all  trade  with  the  other. 

260.  Trickery  of  Napoleon.  —  And  now  Napoleon  came  for 
ward  and  assured  the  American  minister  that  the  Berlin  and 
Milan  Decrees  should  be  recalled  on  November  1,  1810,  pro 
vided  the  United  States  would  restore  non-intercourse  with 
England.     To  this  Madison  agreed,  and  on  November  1,  1810, 
issued  a  proclamation  saying  that  unless  Great  Britain  should, 
before  February  1,  1811,  recall  her  Orders  in  Council,  trade 
with  her  should  stop  on  that  day.     Great  Britain  did  not  re 
call  her  Orders,  and  in  February,  1811,  we  once  more  ceased 
to  trade  with  her. 

Trade  with  France  was  resumed  on  November  1,  1810,  and 
of  course  a  great  fleet  of  merchants  went  off  to  French  ports. 
But  they  were  no  sooner  there  than  the  villainy  of  Napoleon 
was  revealed,  for  on  December  25,  by  general  order,  every 


230       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

American  ship  in  the  French  ports  was  seized,  and  $10,000,000 
worth  of  American  property  was  confiscated.  He  had  not 
recalled  his  Decrees,  but  pretended  to  do  so  in  order  to  get 
the  American  goods  and  provisions  which  he  sorely  needed. 

It  is  surprising  how  patient  the  Americans  of  those  days 
were.  But  their  patience  as  to  Great  Britain  now  gave  out, 
and  our  minister  at  London  was  recalled  in  1811.  This 
alarmed  the  British,  who  promptly  began  to  take  steps  to 
keep  the  peace,  and  offered  to  make  amends  for  the  Leopard- 
Chesapeake  outrage  •  which  had  occurred  four  years  before 
(June,  1807).  They  agreed  to  replace  the  three  American 
sailors  on  the  deck  of  the  Chesapeake,  and  did  so  (June, 
1812).  But  the  day  for  peaceful  settlement  was  gone.  The 
people  were  aroused  and  angry,  and  this  feeling  showed 
itself  in  many  ways. 

261.  The  President  and  the  Little  Belt.  —  In  the  early  part  of 
May,  1811,  a  British  frigate  was  cruising  off  the  harbor  of  New 
York  with  her  name  Guerriere  painted  in  large  letters  on  her 
fore-topsail,  and  one  day  her  captain  stopped  an  American 
vessel  as  it  was  about  to  enter  New  York,  and  impressed  a 
citizen  of  the  United  States.     Three  years  earlier  this  outrage 
would  have  been  made  the  subject  of  a  proclamation.     Now, 
the  moment  it  was  known  at  Washington,  an  order  was  sent  to 
Captain  Rogers  of  the  frigate  President  to  go  to  sea  at  once, 
search  for  the  Guerriere,  and  demand  the  delivery  of  the  man, 
Eogers  was  only  too  glad  to  go,  and  soon  came  in  sight  of  a 
vessel  which  looked  like  the  Guerriere;  but  it  was  half-past 
eight  o'clock  at  night  before  he  came  within  speaking  dis 
tance.     A  battle  followed  and  lasted  till  the  stranger  became 
unmanageable,  when  the  President  stopped  firing;  and  the  next 
morning  Rogers  found  that  his  enemy  was  the  British  twenty- 
two-gun  ship,  Little  Belt. 

262.  The  War  Congress.  —Another  way  in  which  the  anger 
of  the  people  showed  itself  was  in  the  election,  in  the  autumn 
of  1810,  of  a  Congress  which  met  in  December,  1811,  fully 
determined  to  make  war  on  Great  Britain.     In  that  Congress 


"FREE  TRADE  AND   SAILORS'   RIGHTS"  231 

were  two  men  who  from  that  day  on  for  forty  years  were  great 
political  leaders.  One  was  John  C.  Calhoun  of  South  Caro 
lina  ;  the  other  was  Henry  Clay  of  Kentucky. 

Clay  was  made  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
and  under  his  lead  preparations  were  instantly  begun  for  war, 
which  was  finally  declared  June  18,  1812.  There  was  no 
Atlantic  cable  in  those  days.  Had  there  been,  it  is  very 
doubtful  if  war  would  have  been  declared;  for  011  June  23, 
1812,  five  days  after  Congress  authorized  Madison  to  issue  the 
proclamation,  the  Orders  in  Council  were  recalled. 

The  causes  of  war,  as  set  forth  in  the  proclamation,  were 

1.  Tampering  with  the  Indians,  and  urging  them   to  attack 

our  citizens  on  the  frontier. 

2.  Interfering  with  our  trade  by  the  Orders  in  Council. 

3.  Putting  cruisers  off  our  ports  to  stop  and  search  our  vessels. 

4.  Impressing  our  sailors,  of  whom  more  than  6000  were  in 

the  British  service. 

SUMMARY 

1.  One  reason  which  led  Napoleon  to  sell  Louisiana  was  his  determination 

to  go  to  war  with  England.    This  he  did  in  1803. 

2.  Renewal  of  war  in  Europe  made  the  United  States  again  a  neutral 

nation,  and  brought  up  the  old  quarrel  over  neutral  rights. 

3.  In  1806,  Napoleon,  who  was  master  of  nearly  all  western  Europe, 

cut  off  British  trade  with  the  continent.  Great  Britain  in  return 
declared,  by  an  Order  in  Council,  the  coast  from  Brest  to  the  Elbe 
blockaded  ;  that  is,  shut  to  neutral  trade. 

4.  Later  in  the  year  1800  Napoleon  retaliated  with  the  Berlin  Decree, 

declaring  the  British  Islands  blockaded. 

5.  Great  Britain,  by  another  Order  in  Council  (1807),  shut  all  European 

ports,  under  French  control,  to  neutrals. 

6.  Napoleon  struck  back  with  the  Milan  Decree. 

7.  Our  commerce  was  now  attacked  by  both  powers,  and  to  force  them 

to  repeal  their  Decrees  and  Orders  in  Council,  certain  commercial 
restrictions  were  adopted  by  the  United  States. 

A.  Non-importation,  1806. 

B.  Embargo,  1807-1809. 

C.  Non-intercourse,  1809. 

8.  Each  of  them  failed  to  have  any  effect,  and  in  1812  war  was  declared. 


282       STRUGGLE   FOR  COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 


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CHAPTER   XVIII 

THE    WAR   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

263.  Fighting  on  the  Frontier.  — "  Mr.  Madison's  War,"  as 
the  Federalists  delighted  to  call  our  war  for  commercial 
independence,  opened  with  three  armies  in  the  field  ready  to 
invade  and  capture  Canada.  One  under  Hull,  then  governor 
of  the  territory  of  Michigan,  was  to  cross  the  river  at  Detroit, 
and  march  eastward  through  Canada.  A  second,  under  General 
Van  Eensselaer,  was  to  cross  the  Niagara  River,  take  Queens- 
town,  and  join  Hull,  after  which  the  two  armies  were  to  capture 
York,  now  Toronto,  and  go  on  eastward  toward  Montreal. 
Meantime,  the  third  army,  under  Dearborn,  was  to  go  down 
Lake  Cham  plain,  and  meet  the  troops  under  Hull  and  Van 
Rensselaer  before  Montreal.  The  three  were  then  to  capture 
Montreal  and  Quebec,  and  complete  the  conquest  of  Canada. 

The  plan  failed;  for  Hull  was  driven  from  Canada,  and 
surrendered  his  army  and  the  whole  Northwest,  at  Detroit; 
Van  Rensselaer,  defeated  at  Queenstown,  was  unable  even  to 
get  a  footing  in  Canada;  while  Dearborn,  after  reaching  the 
northern  boundary  line  of  New  York,  stopped,  and  the  year 
1812  ended  with  nothing  accomplished. 

The  surrender  of  Hull  filled  the  people  with  indignation, 
aroused  their  patriotism,  and  forced  the  government  to  gather 
a  new  army  for  the  recapture  of  Detroit.  The  command  was 
given  to  William  Henry  Harrison,  who  hurried  from  Cincin 
nati  across  the  wilderness  of  Ohio,  and  in  the  dead  of  winter 
reached  the  shores  of  Lake  Erie.  General  Winchester,  who 
commanded  part  of  the  troops,  was  now  called  on  to  drive  the 
British  from  Frenchtown,  a  little  hamlet  on  the  river  Raisin, 

233 


234       STRUGGLE  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 


THE  CANADIAN  FRONTIER 

AND 

VICINITY  OF  WASHINGTON 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


and  (in  January,  1813)  tried  to 
do  so.  But  the  British  and  In 
dians  came  down  on  him  in  great 
numbers,  and  defeated  and  cap 
tured  his  army,  after  which  the 
Indians  were  allowed  to  massacre 
and  scalp  the  wounded. 

And  now  the  British  became  aggressive,  invaded  Ohio,  and 
attacked  the  Americans  under  Harrison  at  Fort  Meigs,  and 
then  at  Fort  Stephenson,  where  Major  Croghan  and  160  men, 
with  the  aid  of  one  small  cannon,  defeated  and  drove  off  320 
Canadians  and  Indians. 

264.  Battle  of  Lake  Erie.  —  Again  the  Americans  in  turn 
became  aggressive.  Since  the  early  winter,  a  young  naval  officer 
named  Oliver  Hazard  Perry  had  been  hard  at  work,  with  a 
gang  of  ship  carpenters,  at  Erie,  in  Pennsylvania,  cutting  down 
trees,  and  had  used  this  green  timber  to  build  nine  small 
vessels.  With  this  fleet  he  sailed,  in  September,  in  search  of 
the  British  squadron,  which  had  been  just  as  hastily  built,  and 


WAR  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE  235 

soon  found  it  near  Sandusky,  Ohio.  His  own  ship  he  had 
named  the  Lawrence,  in  honor  of  a  gallant  American  captain 
who  had  been  killed  a  few  months  before  in  a  battle  with  an 
English  frigate.  As  Perry  saw  the  enemy  in  the  distance,  he 
flung  to  the  breeze  a  blue  flag  on  which  was  inscribed,  "  Don't 
give  up  the  ship  "  (the  dying  order  of  Lawrence  to  his  men), 
sailed  down  to  meet  the  enemy,  and  fought  the  two  largest 
British  ships  till  the  Lawrence  was  a  wreck.  Then,  with  his 
flag  on  his  arm,  he  jumped  into  a  boat,  and  amidst  a  shower 
of  shot  and  bullets  was  rowed  to  the  Niagara.  Once  on  her 
deck,  he  again  hastened  to  the  attack,  broke  the  British  line  of 
battle,  and  captured  the  entire  fleet.  His  dispatch  to  Harrison 
is  as  famous  as  his  victory :  "  We  have  met  the  enemy,  and 
they  are  ours  —  two  ships,  two  brigs,  one  schooner,  and  one 
sloop." 

265.  Battle  of  the  Thames.  —  Perry's  victory  was  a  grand 
one.     It  gave  him  command  of  Lake  Erie,  and  enabled  him  to 
carry  Harrison's  soldiers  over  to  Canada,  where,  on  the  Thames 
River,  Harrison  defeated  the  British  and  Indians.     These  two 
victories  regained  all  that  had  been  lost  by  the  surrender  of 
Hull. 

Along  the  New  York  border  little  was  done  during  1813. 
The  Americans  made  a  raid  into  Canada,  and  to  their  shame 
burned  York.  The  British  attacked  Sacketts  Harbor  and  were 
driven  off.  The  Americans  sent  an  expedition  down  the  St. 
Lawrence  against  Montreal,  but  the  leaders  got  frightened  and 
took  refuge  in  northern  New  York. 

266.  Campaign  of  1814.  —  In  1814  better  officers  were  put 
in  command,  and  before  winter  came   the  Americans,  under 
Jacob  Brown  and  Winfield  Scott,  had  won  the  battles  of  Chip- 
pewa  and  Lundys   Lane,  and  captured  Fort.  Erie.      But  the 
British  returned  in  force,  burned  Black  Rock  and  Buffalo  in 
revenge  for  the  burning  of  York,  and  forced  the  Americans 
to  leave  Canada. 

The  fighting  along  the  Niagara  River,  by  holding  the  army 
in  that  place,  prevented  the  Americans  from  attacking  Mon- 
McM.  HIST.  — 14 


236       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL   INDEPENDENCE 

treal,  and  enabled  the  British  to  gather  a  fleet  on  Lake  Cham- 
plain,  and  send  an  army  down  from  Quebec  to  invade  New 
York  state  just  as  Burgoyne  had  in  1777.  But  the  land  force 
was  defeated  by  General  Macomb  at  Plattsburg,  while  Thomas 
McDonough  utterly  destroyed  the  fleet  in  Plattsburg  Bay. 
This  was  one  of  the  great  victories  of  the  war. 

267.  The  Sea  Fights.  —  While  our  army  on  the  frontier  was 
accomplishing  little,  our  Avar  ships  were  winning  victory  after 
victory  on  the  sea.  At  the  opening  of  the  war,  our  navy  was 
the  subject  of  English  ridicule  and  contempt.  We  had  sixteen 
ships;  she  had  1200.  She  laughed  at  ours  as  "fir-built  things 
with  a  bit  of  striped  bunting  at  their  mastheads.'7  But  before 
1813  came,  these  "  fir-built  things  "  had  destroyed  her  naval 
supremacy.1  With  the  details  of  all  these  victories  on  the 
sea  we  will  not  concern  ourselves.  Yet  a  few  must  be  men 
tioned  because  the  fame  of  them  still  endures,  and  because 
they  are  examples  of  naval  warfare  in  the  days  when  the 
ships  fought  lashed  together,  and  wrhen  the  boarders,  cutlass 
and  pistol  in  hand,  climbed  over  the  bulwarks  and  met 
the  enemy  on  his  own  deck,  man  to  man.  During  1812  the 
frigate  Constitution,  whose  many  victories  won  her  the  name 
of  "  Old  Ironsides,"  sank  the  Guerriere ;  the  United  /States 
captured  and  brought  to  port  the  Macedonian  ;  and  the  Wasp> 
a  little  sloop  of  eighteen  guns,  after  the  most  desperate  engage 
ment  of  the  whole  war,  captured  the  British  sloop  Frolic. 

When  these  sloops  were  some  two  hundred  feet  apart,  the 
Wasp  opened  with  musketry  and  cannon.  The  sea,  lashed 
into  fury  by  a  two  days'  cyclone,  was  running  mountain  high. 
The  vessels  rolled  till  the  muzzles  of  their  guns  dipped  in  the 

1  One  reason  for  the  success  of  the  American  navy  was  the  experience 
it  had  gained  in  the  clash  with  France,  and  also  in  a  war  with  Tripoli  in 
1801-1805.  At  that  time  the  Christian  nations  whose  ships  sailed  the 
Mediterranean  Sea  were  accustomed  to  pay  annual  tribute  to  Tripoli  and 
other  piratical  states  on  the  north  coast  of  Africa,  under  pain  of  having 
their  ships  seized  and  their  sailors  reduced  to  slavery.  A  dispute  with 
the  United  States  led  to  a  war  which  gained  for  our  ships  the  freedom  of 
the  Mediterranean. 


WAR  FOR   COMMERCIAL  -INDEPENDENCE  237 

water.  But  the  crews  cheered  lustily  and  the  fight  went  on. 
When  at  last  the  crew  of  the  Wasp  boarded  the  Frolic,  they 
were  amazed  to  find  that,  save  the  man  at  the  wheel  and 
three  officers  who  threw  down  their  swords,  not  a  living  soul 
was  visible.  The  crew  had  gone  below  to  avoid  the  terrible  fire 
of  the  Wasp.  Scarcely  was  the  battle  over  when  the  British 
frigate  Poictiers  bore  down  under  a  press  of  sail,  recaptured 
what  was  left  of  the  Frolic,  and  took  the  Wasp  in  addition. 

During  1813  the  Constitution  took  the  Java  ;  the  Hornet 
sank  the  Peacock ;  the  Enterprise  captured  the  Boxer  off 
Portland,  Maine.  These  and  many  more  made  up  the  list 
of  American  victories.  But  there  were  British  victories  also. 
The  Argus,  after  destroying  twenty-seven  vessels  in  the  Eng 
lish  Channel,  was  taken  by  the  Pelican  ;  the  Essex,  after  a 
marvelous  cruise  around  South  America,  was  captured  by  two 
frigates.  The  Chesapeake  was  forced  to  strike  to  the  Shannon. 

The  Chesapeake  was  at  anchor  in  Boston  harbor,  in  com 
mand  of  James  Lawrence,  when  the  British  frigate  Shannon 
ran  in  and  challenged  her.  Lawrence  went  out  at  once,  and 
after  a  short,  fierce  fight  was  defeated  and  killed.  As  his 
men  were  carrying  him  below,  mortally  wounded,  he  cried, 
"  Don't  give  up  the  ship  !  "  words  which  Perry,  as  we  have  seen, 
afterwards  put  on  his  flag,  and  which  his  countrymen  have 
never  since  forgotten.1 

268.  The  British  blockade  the  Coast. — Never,  in  the  course 
of  her  existence,  had  England  suffered  such  a  series  of  defeats 
as  we  inflicted  on  her  navy  in  1812  and  1813.  The  record 
of  those  years  caused  a  tremendous  excitement  in  Great 
Britain,  all  the  vessels  she  could  spare  were  sent  over,  and 
with  the  opening  of  1814,  the  whole  coast  of  the  United 
States  was  declared  to  be  in  a  state  of  blockade.2  In  New 
England,  Eastport  (Moose  Island)  and  Nantucket  Island 

1  On  the  naval  war  read  Maclay's  History  of  the  Navy,  Part  Third  ; 
Roosevelt's  Naval  War  of  1812 ;  McMaster,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  70-108. 

2  All  except  New  England  had  been  blockaded  since  1812  ;  and  in  1813 
the  coast  of  Chesapeake  Bay  had  been  ravaged. 


238       STRUGGLE  FOR  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 

quickly  fell.  A  British  force  went  up  the  Penobscot  to 
Hainpden,  and  burned  the  Adams.  The  eastern  half  of  Maine 
was  seized,  and  Stonington,  in  Connecticut,  was  bombarded. 

269.  Burning  of  Washington.  —  Further  down   the  coast  a 
great  fleet  and  army  from  Bermuda,  under  General  Ross  and 
Admiral  Cockburn,  came  up  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  landed  in 
Maryland,  and  marched  to  Washington.     At  Bladensburg,  a 
little  hamlet  near  the  capital,  the  Americans  made  a  feeble 
show   of   resistance,  but   soon   fled ;    and   about   dark   on   an 
August   night,   1814,   a   detachment   of    the    British  reached 
Washington,  marched  to  the  Capitol,  fired  a  volley  through 
the  windows,  entered,  and  set  fire  to  the  building.     When  the 
fire  began  to  burn  brightly,  Ross  and  Cockburn  led  the  troops 
to  the  President's  house,  which  was  sacked  and  burned.     Next 
morning    the   torch    was   applied   to    the    Treasury   building 
and  to  the  Departments  of  State  and  War.     Several  private 
houses  and  a  printing  office  were  also  destroyed  before  the 
British  began  a  hasty  retreat  to  the  Chesapeake.1 

270.  Baltimore  attacked.  —  Once  on  the  bay,  the  army  was 
hurried  on  board  the  ships  and  carried  to  Baltimore,  where 
for  a  day  and  a  night  they  shelled  Fort  McHenry.2     Failing 
to  take  it,  and  Ross  having  been  killed,  Cockburn  reembarked 
and  sailed  away  to  Halifax. 

271.  The  Victory  at  New  Orleans.  —  The  army  was  taken  to 
Jamaica  in  order  that  it  might  form  part  of  one  of  the  greatest 
war  expeditions  England  had  ever  fitted  out.     Fifty  of  the 
finest  ships  her  navy  could  furnish,  mounting  1000  guns  and 
carrying  on  their  decks  20,000  veteran  soldiers  and  sailors,  had 
been  quietly  assembled  at  Jamaica  during  the  autumn  of  1814, 
and  in  November  sailed  for  New  Orleans. 

News  of  this  intended  attack  had  reached  Madison,  and  he 

1  Adams's  History,  Vol.  VIII.,  Chaps.  5,  6  ;  McMaster's  History,  Vol. 
IV.,  pp.  135-148  ;  Memoirs  of  Dolly  Madison,  Chap.  8. 

2  Francis  S.  Key,  an  American  held  prisoner  on  one  of  the  British 
ships,  composed  the  words  of  The  Star-Spangled  Banner  while  watching 
the  bombardment. 


WAR  FOB  COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE  239 

had  given  the  duty  of  defending  New  Orleans  to  Andrew 
Jackson  of  Tennessee,  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  men  our 
country  has  produced.  The  British  landed  at  the  entrance  of 
Lake  Borgne  in  December,  1814,  and  hurried  to  the  banks  of 
the  Mississippi.  But  Jackson  was  more  than  a  match  for  them. 
Gathering  such  a  force  of  fighting  men  as  he  could,  he 
hastened  from  the  city  and  with  all  possible  speed  threw  up 
a  line  of  rude  earthworks,  and  waited  to  be  attacked.  This 
line  the  British  under  General  Pakenham  attacked  on  Janu 
ary  8,  1815,  and  were  twice  driven  back  with  frightful  loss  of 
life.  Never  had  such  a  defeat  been  inflicted  on  a  British  army. 
The  loss  in  killed,  wounded,  and  missing  was  2036  men. 
Jackson  lost  seventy-one  men.  Five  British  regiments  which 
entered  the  battle  3000  strong  reported  1750  men  killed, 
wounded,  and  missing.1 

272.  Peace.  — Tor  a  month  after  this  defeat  the  British  lin 
gered  in  their  camp.  At  last,  in  February,  the  army  departed 
to  attack  a  fort  on  Mobile  Bay.  The  fort  was  taken,  and  two 
days  later  the  news  of  peace  put  an  end  to  war.  The  treaty 
was  signed  at  Ghent  in  December,  1814;  but  it  did  not  reach 
the  United  States  till  February,  1815. 

In  the  treaty  not  a  word  was  said  about  the  impressment  of 
our  sailors,  nor  about  the  right  of  search,  nor  about  the  Orders 
in  Council,  nor  about  inciting  the  Indians  to  attack  our  fron 
tier,  all  of  which  Madison  had  declared  to  be  causes  of  the 
war.  Yet  we  gained  much.  Our  naval  victories  made  us 
the  equal  of  any  maritime  power,  while  at  home  the  war  did 
far  more  to  arouse  a  national  sentiment,  consolidate  the  union, 
and  make  us  a  nation  than  any  event  which  had  yet  occurred. 

SUMMARY 

1.    The  land  war  may  be  divided  into 

A.  War  along  the  frontier. 

B.  War  along  the  Atlantic  coast. 
Cr  War  along  the  Gulf  coast. 

1  Adams's  History,  Vol.  VIII.,  Chaps.  12-14;  McMaster,  Vol.  IV., 
pp.  182-190. 


240       STRUGGLE   FOR   COMMERCIAL  INDEPENDENCE 


2. 


War  along  the  Canadian  frontier  resulted  in  a  gain  to  neither  side.  In 
1812  Americans  were  beaten  at  Detroit  and  at  Queenstown,  and 
failed  to  invade  Canada.  In  1813  the  Americans  were  beaten  at 
Frenchtown,  but  defeated  the  Canadians  at  Forts  Meigs  and  Stephen- 
son,  and  at  the  Thames  River,  and  recovered  Detroit.  Perry  won 
the  battle  of  Lake  Erie.  The  Americans  failed  in  the  attempt  to 
take  Montreal.  In  1814  the  battles  of  Chippewa  and  Lundys  Lane 
were  won,  and  Fort  Erie  was  taken.  But  the  British  burned  Buffalo 
and  Black  Rock  and  drove  the  Americans  out  of  Canada.  Mc- 
Donough  won  the  battle  of  Lake  Champlain. 

During  1812-13  the  British  blockaded  the  coast  from  the  east  end  of  Long 
Island  south  to  the  Mississippi.  New  England  was  not  blockaded 
till  1814.  Then  depredations  began,  and  during  the  year  Washing 
ton  was  taken  and  partly  burned,  and  Baltimore  attacked. 

Later  in  the  year  the  British,  after  the  attack  on  Baltimore,  went 
south,  and  early  in  1815  were  beaten  by  Jackson  at  New  Orleans. 

The  navy  won  a  series  of  successive  victories.  The  defeats  were 
about  half  as  numerous  as  the  victories. 

Peace  was  announced  in  February,  1815. 


Detroit    . 


Niagara 


1812. 
1812. 
1813. 


1812. 
1813. 
1814. 


Hull  surrenders  Detroit. 
Harrison  attempts  to  recover  it. 
Frenchtown. 
Battle  of  Lake  Erie. 
Harrison  invades  Canada  and  wins 
the  battle  of  the  Thames. 

Van  Rensselaer  repulsed. 

York  taken  and  burned. 

Battles  of  Chippewa  and   Lundys 

Lane,  and  capture  of  Fort  Erie. 
Americans  driven  from  Canada. 

Expedition  against  Montreal. 
British  come   down  from  Canada. 
Defeated  on  Lake  Champlain. 


Blockade  of  the  coast  south  of  Rhode  Island. 

Ravages  on  the  coast  of  Chesapeake  Bay. 

Entire  coast  blockaded. 

New  England  attacked. 

Washington  taken  and  partly  burned. 

Baltimore  attacked. 

Victory  at  New  Orleans. 


[  1813. 
St.  Lawrence.  -I  1814. 


(  1812. 
1813. 
1814. 


1815. 


S±  ® 


f  The  ship  duels. 


The  fleet  victories  on  the  Lakes. 


THE  INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR 
COUNTRY 

CHAPTER    XIX 

PROGRESS   OF   OUR  COUNTRY   BETWEEN  1790   AND   1815 

273.  Twenty-five  years  had  now  gone  by  since  Washington 
was  inaugurated,  and  in  the  course  of  these  years  our  country 
had  made  wonderful  progress.    In  1790  the  United  States  was 
bounded  west  by  the  Mississippi  Eiver.     By  1815  Louisiana 
had  been  purchased,  the  Columbia  Eiver  had  been  discovered, 
and  the  Oregon  country  had  been  explored  to  the  Pacific.     In 
1790  the  inhabitants  of  the  United  States  numbered  less  than 
four  millions.     In  1815  they  were  eight  millions.     In  1790 
there  were  but  thirteen  states  in  the  Union,  and  two  territories. 
In  1815  there  were  eighteen  states  and  five  territories. 

274.  The  Three  Streams  of  Westward  Emigration.  —  Sparse  as 
was  the  population  in  1789,  the  rage  for  emigration  had  already 
seized  the  people,  and  long  before  1790  the  emigrants  were  pour 
ing  over  the  mountains  in  three  great  streams.     One,  composed 
of  New  England  men,  was  pushing  along  the  borders  of  Lake 
Champlain  and  up  the  Mohawk  valley.     A  second,  chiefly 
from  Pennsylvania  and  Virginia,  was  spreading  itself  over  the 
rich  valleys  of  what  are  now  West  Virginia  and  Kentucky. 
Further  south  a  third  stream  of  emigrants,  mostly  from  Vir 
ginia  and  North  Carolina,  had  gone  over  the  Blue  Ridge  Moun 
tains,  and  was  creeping  down  the  valley  of  the   Tennessee 
River.1 

1  For  an  account  of  the  movement  of  population  westward  along  these 
routes,  see  The  First  Century  of  the  Republic,  pp.  211-238. 

241 


242      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

For  months  each  ^ear  the  Ohio  was  dotted  with  flatboats. 
One  observer  saw  fifty  leave  Pittsburg  in  five  weeks.  Another 
estimated  that  ten  thousand  emigrants  floated  by  Marietta  dur 
ing  1788.  As  this  never-ending  stream  of  population  spread 
over  the  wilderness,  building  cabins,  felling  trees,  clearing  the 
land,  and  driving  off  the  game,  the  Indians  took  alarm  and 
determined  to  expel  them. 

275.  The  Indian  War.  —  During   the   summer  of   1786   the 
tribes  whose  hunting  grounds  lay  in  eastern  Tennessee  and  Ken 
tucky  took  the  warpath,  sacked  and  burned  a  little  settlement 
on  the  Holston,  and  spread  terror  along  the  whole  frontier. 
But  the  settlers  in  their  turn  rose,  and  inflicted  on  the  Indians  a 
signal  punishment.     One  expedition  from  Tennessee   burned 
three  Cherokee  towns.     Another  from  Kentucky  crossed  the 
Ohio,  penetrated  the  Indian  country,  burned  eight  towns,  and 
laid  waste  hundreds  of  acres  of  standing  corn.    Had  the  Indians 
been  left  to  themselves,  they  would,  after  this  punishment, 
have  remained  quiet.     But  the   British,  who   still   held  the 
frontier  post  at  Detroit,  roused  them,  and  in  the  summer  of 
1790  they  were  again  at  work,  ravaging  the  country  north 
of  the  Ohio.     St.  Glair,  who  was  governor  of  the  Northwest 
Territory,  sent  against  them  an  expedition  which  won  some 
success  —  just  enough  to  enrage  and  not  enough  to  cow  them  ; 
and  in  January,  1791,  the  Indians  rushed  down  on  Big  Bottom 
(northwest  of  Marietta)  and  swept  it  from  the  face  of  the  earth. 

276.  St.  Clair  ;  Wayne.  —  Not  a  settlement  north  of  the  Ohio 
was  now  safe,  and  had  it  not  been  for  the  men  of  Kentucky, 
who  came  to  the  relief,  and  in  two  expeditions  held  the  Indians 
in  check  till  the  Federal  government  could  act,  every  one  of 
them  would  have  been  destroyed.     The  plan  of  the  Secretary 
of  War  was  to  build  a  chain  of  forts  from  Cincinnati  to  Lake 
Michigan,  and  late  in  1791  St.  Clair  set  off  to  begin  the  work. 
But  the  Indians  surprised  him  on  a  branch  of  the  Wabash 
River,  and  inflicted  on  him  one  of  the  most  dreadful  defeats 
in  our  history.     Public  opinion  now  forced  him  to  resign  his 
command,  which  was  given  to  Anthony  Wayne,  who,  after 


PROGRESS  BETWEEN   1790  AND   1815  243 

two  years  of  careful  preparation,  crushed  the  Indian  power 
at  the  falls  of  the  Maumee  River  in  northwestern  Ohio.  The 
next  year,  1795,  a  treaty  was  made  at  Greenville,  by  which 
the  Indians  gave  up  all  claim  to  the  soil  south  and  east  of 
a  boundary  line  drawn  from  what  is  now  Cleveland  southwest 
to  the  Ohio  River  (see  the  map  on  p.  193). 

277.  Kentucky  and  Vermont  become  States.  —  These  Indian 
wars  almost  stopped  emigration  to  the  country  north  of  the 
Ohio,  though  not  into  Kentucky  or  Tennessee.  For  several 
years  past  the  people  of  the  District  of  Kentucky  had  been 
desirous  to  come  into  the  Union,  but  had  been  unable  to  make 
terms  with  Virginia,  to  which  Kentucky  belonged.  At  last 
consent  was  obtained  and  the  application  made  to  Congress. 
But  the  Kentuckians  were  slave  owners,  were  identified  with 
Southern  and  Western  interests,  and  cared  little  for  the  com 
mercial  interests  of  the  East,  and  as  this  influence  could  be 
strongly  felt  in  the  Senate,  where  each  state  had  two  votes, 
it  was  decided  to  offset  those  of  Kentucky  by  admitting  the 
Eastern  state  of  Vermont. 

What  is  now  Vermont  was  once  the  property  of  New  Hamp 
shire,  was  settled  by  people  from  New  England  under  town 
rights  granted  by  the  governor  of  New  Hampshire,  and  was 
called  "New  Hampshire  Grants."  In  1764,  however,  the  gov 
ernor  of  New  York  obtained  a  royal  order  giving  New  York 
jurisdiction  over  the  Grants  on  the  ground  that  in  1664  the 
possessions  of  the  Duke  of  York  extended  to  the  Connecticut 
River.  Then  began  a  controversy  which  was  still  raging  bit 
terly  when  the  Revolution  opened,  and  the  Green  Mountain 
Boys  asked  recognition  as  a  state  and  admission  into  the 
Congress,  a  request  .which  the  other  states  were  afraid  to 
grant  lest  by  so  doing  they  should  offend  New  York.  There 
upon  the  people  chose  delegates  to  a  convention  (in  1777), 
which  issued  a  declaration  of  independence,  declared  "New 
Connecticut,  alias  Vermont,"  a  state,  and  made  a  constitution. 
In  this  shape  matters  stood  in  1791,  when  as  an  offset  to  Ken 
tucky  Vermont  was  admitted  into  the  Union.  As  she  was  a 


244      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR   COUNTRY 


THE 

UNITED  STATES 

AND  TERRITORIES 
July  4,  1801. 

TWENTY-FIVE  YEARS 
AFTER  INDEPENDENCE 


state  with  governor,  legislature,  and  constitution,  she  came  in 
at  once.  Kentucky  had  to  make  a  constitution,  and  so  was 
not  admitted  till  1792.  Four  years  later  (1796)  Congress 
admitted  Tennessee. 

278.  The  New  Territories;  Ohio  becomes  a  State. — The 
quieting  of  the  Indians  by  Wayne  in  1794,  the  opening  of  the 
Mississippi  Iliver  to  American  trade  by  Spain  in  1795,  coupled 


PROGRESS  BETWEEN   1790  AND   1815 


245 


with  cheap  lands  and  low  taxes,  caused  another  rush  of  popu 
lation  into  the  Ohio  valley.  Between  1795  and  1800  so  many 
came  that  the  Northwest  Territory  was  cut  in  twain  and  the 
new  territory  of  Indiana  was  organized  in  1800.  The  accept 
ance  by  Spain  in  1795  of  31°  north  latitude  as  the  boundary  of 
the  Floridas,  gave  the  United  States  control  of  the  greater 
part  of  old  West  Florida,  which  in  1798  was  organized  as  the 
Mississippi  Territory.  Hardly  a  year  now  elapsed  without 


Cincinnati  in  iSio1 

some  marked  sign  of  Western  development.  In  1800  Congress, 
under  the  influence  of  William  Henry  Harrison,  the  first  dele 
gate  from  the  Northwest  Territory,  made  a  radical  change  in 
its  land  policy.  Up  to  that  time  every  settler  must  pay  cash. 
After  1800  he  could  buy  on  credit,  pay  in  four  annual  install 
ments,  and  west  of  the  Muskingum  River  could  purchase  as 
little  as  320  acres.  This  credit  system  led  to  another  rush  into 
the  Ohio  valley,  and  so  many  people  entered  the  Northwest 
Territory,  that  in  1803  the  southern  part  of  it  was  admitted  into 
the  Union  as  the  state  of  Ohio. 

1  From  an  old  print. 


246      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

In  1802  Georgia  ceded  her  western  lands,  which  were  added 
to  the  Mississippi  Territory.  From  the  Louisiana  purchase 
there  was  organized  in  1804  the  territory  of  Orleans,  and  in 
1805  the  territory  of  Louisiana  (see  p.  247).  In  1805,  also, 
the  lower  peninsula  of  Michigan  was  cut  off  from  Indiana  and 
organized  as  Michigan  Territory.  In  1809  the  territory  of 
Illinois  was  organized  (p.  247).  In  1812  the  territory  of  Or 
leans  became  the  state  of  Louisiana. 

The  third  census  showed  that  in  1810  the  population  of  the 
United  States  was  7,200,000,  and  that  of  these  over  1,000,000 
were  in  the  states  and  territories  west  of  the  Alleghanies. 

279.  Indian  Troubles  ;  Battle  of  Tippecanoe.  —  As  the  settlers 
north  of  the  Ohio  moved  further  westward,  and  as  more  came 
in,  their  farms  and  settlements  touched  the  Indian  boundary 
line.     In  Indiana,  where,  save  a  strip  sixty  miles  wide  along 
the  Ohio  River,  and  a  few  patches  scattered  over  the  territory, 
every  foot  of  soil  was^owned  by  the  Indians,  this  crowding 
led  to  serious  consequences.     The  Indians  first  grew  restive. 
Then,  under  the  lead  of  Tecumthe,  or  Tecumseh,  they  founded 
a  league  or  confederacy  against  the  whites,  and  built  a  town  on 
Tippecanoe  Creek,  just  where  it  enters  the  Wabash.     Finally, 
when  Harrison,  who  was  governor  of  Indiana  Territory,  bought 
the  Indian  rights  to  the  Wabash  valley,  the  confederacy  refused 
to  recognize  the  sale,  and  gave  such  signs  of  resistance  that 
Harrison  marched  against  them,  and  in  1811  fought  the  battle 
of  Tippecanoe  and  burned  the  Indian  village.     For  a  time  it 
was  thought  the  victory  was  as  signal  as  that  of  Wayne.     But 
the  Indians  were  soon  back  on  the  old  site,  and  in  our  second 
war  with  Great  Britain  they  sided  with  the  British. 

280.  Industrial   Progress. — In   1789   our    country   had    no 
credit  and  no  revenue,  and  was  burdened  with  a  great  debt 
which  very  few  people  believed  would  ever  be  paid.      But 
when  the   government   called   in  all  the  old  worthless  Con 
tinental  money  and  certificates  and  gave  the  people  bonds  in 
exchange  for  them,  when  it  began  to  lay  taxes  and  pay  its 
debts,  when  it  had  power  to  regulate  trade,  when  the  National 


"U  < 

?v. 


247 


248      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR    COUNTRY 

Bank  was  established  and  the  merchants  were  given  bank  bills 
that  would  pass  at  their  face  value  all  over  the  country,  busi 
ness  began  to  revive.  The  money  which  the  people  had  been 
hiding  away  for  years  was  brought  out  and  put  to  useful 
purposes.  Banks  sprang  up  all  over  the  country,  and  com 
panies  were  founded  to  manufacture  woolen  cloth  and  cotton 
cloth,  to  build  bridges,  to  construct  turnpike  roads,  and  to 
cut  canals.  Between  1789  and  1795  the  first  carpet  was  woven 
in  the  United  States,  the  first  broom  made  from  broom  corn, 
the  first  cotton  factory  opened,  the  first  gold  and  silver  coins 
of  the  United  States-  were  struck  at  the  mint,  the  first  news 
paper  was  printed  in  the  territory  northwest  of  the  Ohio  River, 
the  first  printing  press  was  set  up  in  Tennessee,  the  first 
geography  of  the  United  States  was  published,  and  daily 
newspapers  were  issued  in  Baltimore  and  Boston.  It  was 
during  this  period  that  a  hunter  named  Guinther  discovered 
anthracite  coal  in  Pennsylvania;  that  Whitney  invented  the 
cotton  gin;  that  Samuel  Slater  built  the  first  mill  for  making 
cotton  yarns  ;  that  Eli  Terry  started  the  manufacture  of  clocks 
as  a  business ;  that  cotton  sewing  thread  was  first  manufac 
tured  in  the  United  States  at  Pawtucket,  R.I. ;  and  that  the 
first  turnpike  in  our  country  was  completed.  This  extended 
from  Philadelphia  to  Lancaster,  a  distance  of  sixty-two  miles. 
281.  The  Period  of  Commercial  and  Agricultural  Prosperity. 
—  Just  at  this  time  came  another  change  of  great  impor 
tance.  Till  1793  we  had  scarcely  any  commerce  with  the 
West  Indies.  England  would  not  allow  our  vessels  to  go  to 
her  islands.  Neither  would  Spain,  nor  France,  except  to  a 
very  limited  degree.  It  was  the  policy  of  these  three  coun 
tries  to  confine  such  trade  as  far  as  possible  to  their  own 
merchants.  But  in  1793  France,  you  remember,  made  war  on 
England  and  opened  her  West  Indian  ports  to  all  neutral 
nations.  The  United  States  was  a  neutral,  and  our  merchants 
at  once  began  to  trade  with  the  islanders.  What  these  people 
wanted  was  lumber,  flour,  grain,  provisions,  salt  pork,  and 
fish.  All  this  led  to  a  demand,  first,  for  ships,  then  for 


PROGRESS  BETWEEN  1790  AND   1815  249 

sailors,  and  then  for  provisions  and  lumber  —  to  the  benefit 
of  every  part  of  the  country  except  the  South.  New  England 
was  the  lumber,  fishing,  shipbuilding,  and  commercial  sec 
tion.  New  York  and  Pennsylvania  produced  grain,  flour, 
lumber,  and  carried  on  a  great  commerce  as  well.  So  profit 
able  was  it  to  raise  wheat,  that  in  many  parts  of  Virginia  the 
people  stopped  raising  tobacco  and  began  to  make  flour,  and 
soon  made  Virginia  the  second  flour-producing  state  in  the 
Union.  Until  after  1795  the  people  of  the  Western  States 
were  cut  off  from  this  trade.  But  in  that  year  the  treaty  with 
Spain  was  made,  and  the  people  of  the  West  were  then  allowed 
to  float  their  produce  to  New  Orleans  and  there  sell  it  or 
ship  it  to  the  West  Indies.  Kentucky  then  became  a  flour- 
producing  state. 

As  a  consequence  of  all  this,  people  stopped  putting  their 
money  into  roads  and  canals  and  manufactures,  and  put  it  into 
farming,  shipbuilding,  and  commerce.  Between  1793  and 
1807,  therefore,  our  country  enjoyed  a  period  of  commercial 
and  agricultural  prosperity.  But  with  1807  came  another 
change.  In  that  year  the  embargo  was  laid,  and  for  more  than 
fifteen  months  no  vessels  were  allowed  to  leave  the  ports  of  the 
United  States  for  foreign  countries.  Up  to  this  time  our 
people  had  been  so  much  engaged  in  commerce  and  agricul 
ture,  that  they  had  not  begun  to  manufacture.  In  1807  all 
the  blankets,  all  the  woolen  cloth,  cotton  cloth,  carpets,  hard 
ware,  china,  glass,  crockery,  knives,  tools,  and  a  thousand 
other  things  used  every  day  were  made  for  us  in  Great 
Britain.  Cotton  grown  in  the  United  States  was  actually  sent 
to  England  to  be  made  into  cloth,  which  was  then  carried  back 
to  the  United  States  to  be  used. 

282.  "Infant  Manufactures."  —  As  the  embargo  prevented 
our  ships  going  abroad  and  foreign  ships  coming  to  us,  these 
goods  could  no  longer  be  imported.  The  people  must  either 
go  without  or  make  them  at  home.  They  decided,  of  course, 
to  make  them  at  home,  and  all  patriotic  citizens  were  called 
on  to  help,  which  they  did  in  five  ways. 


250      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

First,  in  each  of  the  cities  and  large  towns  people  met  and 
formed  a  "  Society  for  the  Encouragement  of  Domestic  Manu 
factures."  Every  patriotic  man  and  woman  was  expected  to 
join  one  of  them,  and  in  so  doing  to  take  a  pledge  not  to  buy 
or  use  or  wear  any  article  of  foreign  make,  provided  it  could 
be  made  in  this  country. 

In  the  second  place,  these  societies  for  the  encouragement  of 
domestic  manufactures,  "infant  manufactures,"  as  they  were 
called,  offered  prizes  for  the  best  piece  of  homemade  linen, 
homemade  cotton  cloth,  or  woolen  cloth. 

In  the  third  place,  they  started  "exchanges,"  or  shops,  in 
the  cities  and  large  towns,  to  which  anybody  who  could  knit 
mittens  or  socks,  or  make  boots  and  shoes  or  straw  bonnets, 
or  spin  flax  or  wool,  or  make  anything  else  that  the  people 
needed,  could  send  them  to  be  sold. 

In  the  fourth  place,  men  who  had  money  came  forward  and 
formed  companies  to  erect  mills  and  factories  for  the  manu 
facture  of  all  sorts  of  things.  If  you  were  to  see  the 
acts  passed  by  the  legislatures  of  the  states  between  1808 
and  1812,  you  would  find  that  very  many  of  them  were 
charters  for  iron  works,  paper  mills,  thread  works,  factories 
for  making  cotton  and  woolen  cloth,  oilcloth,  boots,  shoes, 
rope. 

In  the  fifth  place,  the  legislatures  of  the  states  passed  reso 
lutions  asking  their  members  to  wear  clothes  made  of  material 
produced  in  the  United  States,1  offered  bounties  for  the  best 
wool,  and  exempted  the  factories  from  taxation  and  the  mill 
hands  from  militia  and  jury  duty. 

Thus  encouraged,  manufactures  sprang  up  in  the  North,  and 
became  so  numerous  that  in  1810,  when  the  census  of  popula 
tion  was  taken,  Congress  ordered  that  statistics  of  manufac 
tures  should  be  collected  at  the  same  time.  It  was  then  found 
that  the  value  of  the  goods  manufactured  in  the  United  States 
in  1810  was  $173,000,000. 

1  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  III.,  pp. 
496-509. 


PROGRESS   BETWEEN   1790   AND   1815  251 

283.   Internal  Improvements:  Roads;  Canals;  Steamboats. — 

But  there  was  yet  another  great  change  for  the  better  which 
took  place  between  1790  and  1815.  We  have  seen  how  during 
this  quarter  of  a  century  our  country  grew  in  area,  how 
the  people  increased  in  number,  how  new  states  and  terri 
tories  were  made,  how  agriculture  and  commerce  prospered, 
and  how  manufactures  arose.  It  is  now  time  to  see  how  the 
people  improved  the  means  of  interstate  commerce  and  com 
munication. 

You  will  remember  that  in  1790  there  were  no  bridges  over 
the  great  rivers  of  the  country,  that  the  roads  were  very  bad, 
that  all  journeys  were  made  on  horseback  or  in  stagecoaches  or 
in  boats,  and  that  it  was  not  then  possible  to  go  as  far  in  ten 
hours  as  we  can  now  go  in  one.  You  will  remember,  also, 
that  the  people  were  moving  westward  in  great  numbers. 

As  the  people  thus  year  by  year  went  further  and  further 
westward,  a  demand  arose  for  good  roads  to  connect  them  with 
the  East.  The  merchants  on  the  seaboard  wanted  to  send 
them  hardware,  clothing,  household  goods,  farming  imple 
ments,  and  bring  back  to  the  seaports  the  potash,  lumber,  flour, 
skins,  and  grain  with  which  the  settlers  paid  for  these  things. 
If  they  were  too  costly,  frontiersmen  could  not  buy  them.  If 
the  roads  were  bad,  the  difficulty  of  getting  merchandise  to 
the  frontier  would  make  them  too  costly.  People  living  in  the 
towns  and  cities  along  the  seaboard  were  no  longer  content 
with  the  old-fashioned  slow  way  of  travel.  They  wanted  to 
get  their  letters  more  often,  make  their  journeys  and  have 
their  freight  carried  more  quickly.1 

About  1805,  therefore,  men  began  to  think  of  reviving  the 
old  idea  of  canals,  which  had  been  abandoned  in  1793,  and 
one  of  these  canal  companies,  the  Chesapeake  and  Delaware 
Canal,  applied  to  Congress  for  aid.  This  brought  up  the  ques 
tion  of  a  system  of  internal  improvements  at  national  expense, 
and  Albert  Gallatin,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  was  asked 

1  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States.  Vol.  III.,  pp. 
462-465. 


252     INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR  COUNTRY 

to  send  a  plan  for  such  a  system  to  Congress,  which  he  did. 
Congress  never  approved  it. 

284.  The  National  Pike.  —  Public  sentiment,  however,  led  to 
the  commencement  of  a  highway  to  the  West  known  as  the 
National  Pike,  or  the  Cumberland  Road.  When  Ohio  was 
admitted  into  the  Union  as  a  state  in  1803,  Congress  promised 
that  part  of  the  money  derived  from  the  sale  of  land  in  Ohio 
should  be  used  to  build  a  road  from  some  place  on  the  Ohio 


Phcenixi 

Elver  to  tide  water.  By  1806  the  money  so  set  apart  amounted 
to  $12,000,  and  with  this  was  begun  the  construction  of 
a  broad  pike  from  Cumberland  (on  the  Potomac)  in  Maryland 
to  Wheeling  (on  the  Ohio)  in  West  Virginia.2 

285.  Steamboats.  —  This  increasing  demand  for  cheap  trans 
portation  now  made  it  possible  for  Fulton  to  carry  into  success 
ful  operation  an  idea  he  had  long 'had  in  mind.  For  twenty 
years  past  inventors  had  been  exhibiting  steamboats.  James 
Eumsey  had  exhibited  one  on  the  Potomac.  John  Fitch  had 

1  From  an  oil  painting. 

2  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  469^70. 


PROGRESS  BETWEEN   1790  AND    1815  253 

shown  one  on  the  Delaware  in  1787.  (See  p.  190.)  In 
1804  Robert  Fulton  exhibited  a  steamboat  on  the  Seine  at 
Paris  in  France;  Oliver  Evans  had  a  steam  scow  on  the  Dela 
ware  River  at  Philadelphia;  and  John  Stevens  crossed  the 
Hudson  from  Hoboken  to  New  York  in  a  steamboat  of  his  own 
construction.  In  1806  Stevens  built  another,  the  Phoenix.1 

These  men  were  ahead  of  their  time,  and  it  was  not  till  the 
August  day,  1807,  when  Robert  Fulton  made  his  experiment 
on  the  Hudson,  that  the  era  of  the  steamboat  opened.  His 
vessel,  called  the  Clermont,  made  the  trip  up  the  river  from 
New  York  to  Albany  in  thirty-two  hours. 


Model  of  the  Clermont' 

Then  the  usefulness  of  the  invention  was  at  last  appreci 
ated,  and  in  1808  a  line  of  steam  vessels  went  up  and  down  the 
Hudson.  In  1809  Stevens  sent  his  Phoenix  by  sea  to  Phila 
delphia  and  ran  it  on  the  Delaware.  Another  steamboat  was 
on  the  Raritan  River,  and  a  third  on  Lake  Champlain.  In 

1811  a  boat  steamed  from  Pittsburg  to  New  Orleans,  and  in 

1812  steam  ferryboats  plied  between  what  is  now  Jersey  City 
and  New  York,  and  between  Philadelphia  and  Camden.3 

286.  The  Currency;  the  Mint.  —  Quite  as  marvelous  was  the 
change  which  in  five  and  twenty  years  had  taken  place  in 
money  matters.  When  the  Constitution  became  law  in  1789, 

1  Treble's  History  of  Steam  Navigation,  pp.  35-66  ;  Thurston's  Robert 
Fulton  in  Makers  of  America  Series. 

2  Made  from  the  original  drawings,  and  now  in  the  National  Museum. 
8  On  the  early  steamboats  see  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the 

United  States,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  486-494. 


254     INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUR  COUNTRY 

there  were  no  United  States  coins  and  no  United  States  bills 
or  notes  in  circulation.  There  was  no  such  thing  as  a  national 
currency.  Except  the  gold  and  silver  pieces  of  foreign  nations, 
there  was  no  money  which  would  pass  all  over  our  country. 
To-day  a  treasury  note,  a  silver  certificate,  a  national  bank 
bill,  is  received  in  payment  of  a  debt  in  any  state  or  territory. 
In  1789  the  currency  was  foreign  coins  and  state  paper.  But 
the  Constitution  forbade  the  states  ever  to  make  any  more 
money,  and  as  their  bills  of  credit  already  issued  would 
wear  out  by  use,  the  time  was  near  when  there  would  be  no 
currency  except  foreign  coins.  To  prevent  this,  Congress  in 

1791  ordered  a  mint  to  be  established  at  Philadelphia,  and  in 

1792  named  the  coins  to  be  struck,  and  ordered  that  whoever 
would  bring  gold  or  silver  to  the  mint  should  have  it  made 
into  coins  without  cost  to  him.     This  was  free  coinage.     As 
both  gold  and  silver  were  to  be  coined,  the  currency  was  to 
be  bimetallic,  or  of  two  metals.1     The  ratio  of  silver  and  gold 
was  15  to  1.     That  is,  fifteen  pounds'  weight  of  silver  must 
be  made  into  as  many  dollars'  worth  of  coins  as  one  pound 
of  gold.     The  silver  coins  were  to  be  the  dollar,  half  and 
quarter  dollar,  dime  and  half  dime ;   the  gold  were  to  be  the 
eagle,  half  eagle,  and  quarter  eagle.     Out  of  copper  were  to  be 
struck  cents  and  half  cents.       As  souae  years  must  elapse 
before   our  national   coins   could   become  abundant,   certain 
foreign  coins  were  made  legal  tender. 

287.  "  Federal  Money."  — The  appearance  of  the  new  money 
was  followed  by  another  change  for  the  better.  In  colonial 
days  the  merchants  and  the  people  expressed  the  debts  they 
owed,  or  the  value  of  the  goods  they  sold,  in  pounds,  shillings, 
and  pence,  or  in  Spanish  dollars.  During  the  Revolution,  and 
after  it,  this  was  continued,  although  the  Continental  Congress 
always  kept  its  accounts,  and  made  its  appropriations,  in  dol 
lars.  But  when  the  people  began  to  see  dollars,  half  dollars, 
and  dimes  bearing  the  words  "  United  States  of  America," 

i  The  first  silver  coin  was  struck  in  1794  ;  the  first  gold,  in  1795 ;  the 
first  cent  and  half  cent,  in  1793. 


r\  ^  /T 

PROGRESS  BETWEEN   1790  AND   1815  255 

they  knew  that  there  really  was  a  national  coinage,  or  "Fed 
eral  money/'  as  they  called  it,  and  between  1795  and  1798,  oae 
state  after  another  ordered  its  treasurer  to  use  Federal  money 
instead  of  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence ;  and  thereafter  in 
laying  taxes,  and  voting  appropriations  for  any  purpose,  the 
amount  was  expressed  in  dollars  and  cents.  The  merchants 
and  the  people  were  much  slower  in  adopting  the  new  terms ; 
but  they  came  at  last  into  general  use. 

288.  Rise  of  the  State  Banks.  —  Had  the  people  been  forced 
to  depend  on  the  United  States  mint  for  money  wherewith  to 
pay  the  butcher  and  the  baker  and  the  shoemaker,  they  would 
not  have  been  able  to  make  their  payments,  for  the  machinery 
at  the  mint  was  worked  by  hand,  and  the  number  of  dimes  and 
quarters  turned  out  each  year  was  small.  But  they  were  not, 
for  as  soon  as  confidence  was  restored,  banks  chartered  by  the 
states  sprang  up  in  the  chief  cities  in  the  East,  and  as.  each 
issued  notes,  the  people  had  all  the  currency  they  wanted. 

In  1790,  when  Congress  established  the  National  Bank,  there 
were  but  four  state  banks  in  the  whole  country :  one  in 
Philadelphia,  one  in  New  York,  one  in  Boston,  and  one  in 
Baltimore.  By  1800  there  were  twenty-six,  in  1805  there 
were  sixty-four,  and  in  1811  there  were  eighty-eight. 

In  that  year  (1811)  the  charter  of  the  National  Bank  ex 
pired,  and  as  Congress  would  not  renew  it,  many  more  state 
banks  were  created,  each  hoping  to  get  a  part  of  the  business 
formerly  done  by  the  National  Bank.  Such  was  the  "  mania," 
as  it  was  called,  for  banks,  that  the  number  rose  from  eighty- 
eight  in  1811,  to  two  hundred  and  eight  in  1814,  which  .was 
far  more  than  the  people  really  needed. 

Nevertheless,  all  went  well  until  the  British  came  up  Chesa 
peake  Bay  and  burned  Washington.  Then  the  banks  in  that 
part  of  the  country  boxed  up  all  their  gold  and  silver  and  sent 
it  away,  lest  the  British  should  get  it.  This  forced  them  to 
"suspend  specie  payments";  that  is,  refuse  to  give  gold  or 
silver  in  exchange  for  their  own  paper.  As  soon  as  they  sus 
pended,  others  did  the  same,  till  in  a  few  weeks  every  one 
McM.  HIST.  — 15 


256      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR"  ^COUNTRY 

along  the  seaboard  from  Albany  to  Savannah,  and  every  one 
in  Ohio,  had  stopped  paying  coin.  The  New  England  banks 
did  not  suspend. 

289.  No  Small  Change.  —  The  consequences  of  the  suspension 
were  very  serious.     In  the  first  place,  all  the  small  silver  coins, 
the  dimes,  half  dollars,  and  quarter  dollars,  disappeared  at  once, 
and  the  people  were  again  forced  to  do  as  they  had  done  in 
1789,  and  use  "  ticket  money."     All  the  cities  and  towns,  great 
and  small,  printed  one,  two,  three,  six  and  one  fourth,  twelve 
and  one  half,  twenty -five,  and  fifty-cent  tickets,  and  sold  them 
to  the  people  for  bank  notes.     Steamboats,  stagecoaches,  and 
manufacturing  companies,  merchants,  shopkeepers  —  in   fact, 
all  business  men  —  did  the  same. 

In  the  second  place,  as  the  banks  would  not  exchange  specie 
for  their  notes,  people  who  did  not  know  all  about  a  bank 
would  not  take  its  bills  except  at  very  much  less  than  their 
face  value.  That  is,  a  dollar  bill  of  a  Philadelphia  bank  was 
not  worth  more  than  ninety  cents  in  paper  money  at  New  York, 
and  seventy-five  cents  at  Boston.  This  state  of  things  greatly 
increased  the  cost  of  travel  and  business  between  the  states, 
and  prevented  the  government  using  the  money  collected  at 
the  seaports  in  the  East  to  pay  debts  due  in  the  West.1 

290.  The  Second  Bank  of  the  United  States.  —Lest  this  state 
of  affairs  should  occur  again,  Congress,  exercising  its  constitu 
tional  "power  to  regulate  the  currency,"  chartered  a  second 
National  Bank  in  1816,  and  modeled  it   after   the   old  one. 
Again  the  parent  bank  was  at  Philadelphia;  but  the  capital 
was  now  $35,000,000.      Again  the   public   money  might   be 
deposited  in  the  bank  and  its  branches,  which  could  be  estab 
lished  wherever   the   directors   thought   proper.      Again   the 
bank  could  issue  paper  money  to  be  received  by  the  govern 
ment  in  payment  of  taxes,  land,  and  all  debts. 

The  Kepublicans  had  always  denied  the  right  of  Congress  to 
charter  a  bank.     But  the  question  was  never  tested  until  1819, 
when  Maryland  attempted  to  collect  a  tax  laid  on  the  branch 
i  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  280-318. 


f90   AND    1815 


257 


at  Baltimore.  The  case  reached  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States,  which  decided  that  a  state  could  not  tax  a  cor 
poration  chartered  by  Congress ;  and  that  Congress  had  power 

to  charter  anything,  even  a  bank. 

i 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  census  returns  of  1790  showed  that  population  was  going  west 

along  three  highways. 

2.  As  a  result  of  this  movement,  Vermont   (1791),   Kentucky  (1792), 

Tennessee  (1796),  and  Ohio  (1803)  entered  the  Union. 

3.  The  population  of  the  country  increased  from  3,380,000  in  1790  to 

7,200,000  in  1810;  and  the  area  from  about  828,000  to  2,000,000  square 
miles. 

4.  The  period  1790-1810  was  one  of  marked  industrial  progress,  and  of 

great  commercial  and  agricultural  prosperity.  It  was  during  this 
time  that  manufactures  arose,  that  many  roads  and  highways  and 
bridges  were  built,  and  that  the  steamboat  was  introduced. 

5.  A  national  mint  had  been  established.     The  charter  of  the  National 

Bank  had  expired,  and  numbers  of  state  banks  had  arisen  to  take  its 
place.  These  banks  had  suspended  specie  payment,  and  the  govern 
ment  had  been  forced  to  charter  a  new  National  Bank. 


[  Checked  by  Indian  war. 
Northern  stream,  -j  Indians  quieted  by  Wayne. 

[  Population  again  moved  westward. 


New  states. 


I       I 


Expansion  of 
Territory 


1795' 

1802t 
1803. 


New  territories. 


1791.  Vermont. 

1792.  Kentucky. 
1796.  Tennessee.    ' 

1803.  Ohio. 
1812.  Louisiana. 

1798.  Mississippi. 

1800.  Indiana. 

1802.  Mississippi  enlarged. 

1804.  Orleans. 

1805.  Michigan. 

1805.  Louisiana     (called     Missouri 

after  1812). 

I  1809.  Illinois. 


Spain  accePts  31°  as  the  boundary. 
GeorSia  cedes  her  western  territory. 
Louisiana  purchased  from  France. 


258      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR   COUNTRY 


^.. 

i 


First  carpet  mill. 
First  brooms. 

First  United  States  gold  and  silver  coins. 
First  press  in  Tennessee. 
Daily  newspapers. 
Discovery  of  hard  coal. 
Cotton  gin. 

1  Manufacture  of  clocks. 
Sewing  thread. 


Rise  of 
manufactures. 


Agricultural  Progress 


Improvements  in    Trans- 


Financial    Condi 
tion 


g  a 


Dependence  of  United  States  on  Great 

Britain  before  1807. 
Effect  of  the  embargo. 
Manner  of  encouraging  manufactures. 

Effect  of  the  French  war. 


agriculture 


New  England. 
New  York  and  Pennsyl 
vania. 
The  South. 


Demand  for  roads  and  canals. 
The  national  pike. 

Early  forms. 

Fitch's. 
Steamboats.  \  Fulton's. 
\  Stevens's. 
I  Rapid  introduction  of. 

The  United  States  mint  established. 

Free  coinage. 

Bimetallism. 

Coins  struck. 

Federal  money  comes  slowly  into  use. 

What  led  to  the  chartering  of  state 

banks. 

Their  rapid  increase. 
Effect  of  the  expiration  of  the  charter 

of  the  Bank  of  the  United  States. 
General  suspension  in  1814. 
Reason  for  chartering  the  second  Bank 

of  the  United  States. 


CHAPTER   XX 
SETTLEMENT   OF   OUR  BOUNDARIES 

291.  Monroe  inaugurated.  —  The  administration  of  Madison 
ended  on  March  4,  1817,  and  on  that  day  James  Monroe  and 
Daniel  D.  Tompkins  were  sworn  into  office.     They  had  been 
nominated  at  Washington  in  February,  1816, 

by  a  caucus  of  Republican  members  of  Con 
gress,  for  no  such  thing  as  a  national  con 
vention  for  the  nomination  of  a  President 
had  as  yet  been  thought  of.  The  Federal 
ists  did  not  hold  a  caucus ;  but  it  was  under 
stood  that  their  electors  would  vote  for 
Rufus  King  for  President.1 

292.  Death  of  the  Federalist  Party.  —  The 

inauguration  of   Monroe  opens  a  new  era 

James  Monroe 
of   great   interest   and   importance   in   our 

history.  From  1793  to  1815,  the  questions  which  divided 
the  people  into  Federalists  and  Republicans  were  all  in  some 
way  connected  with  foreign  countries.  They  were  neutral 
rights,  Orders  in  Council,  French  Decrees,  impressment,  em 
bargoes,  non-intercourse  acts,  the  conduct  of  England,  the 
insolence  of  the  French  Directory,  the  triumphs  and  the  treach 
ery  of  Napoleon.  Every  Federalist  sympathized  with  Eng 
land  ;  every  Republican  was  a  warm  supporter  of  France. 

But  with  the  close  of  the  war  in  1815,  all  this  ended.  Na 
poleon  was  sent  to  St.  Helena.  Europe  was  at  peace,  and  there 
was  no  longer  any  foreign  question  to  divide  the  people  into 

1  In  1816  there  were  nineteen  states  in  the  Union  (Indiana  having  been 
admitted  in  that  year),  and  of  these  Monroe  carried  sixteen  and  King 
three.  The  inauguration  took  place  in  the  open  air  for  the  first  time 
since  1789. 

259 


260      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

Federalists  and  Republicans.  This  division,  therefore,  ceased 
to  exist,  and  after  1816  the  Federalist  party  never  put  up  a 
candidate  for  the  presidency.  It  ceased  to  exist  not  only  as 
a  national  but  even  as  a  state  party,  and  for  twelve  years 
there  was  one  great  party,  the  Republican,  or,  as  it  soon  began 
to  be  called,  the  Democratic. 

293.  The  "  Era  of  Good  Feeling."  —  A  sure  sign  of  the  disap 
pearance  of  party  and  party  feeling  was  seen  very  soon  after 
Monroe  was  inaugurated.     In  May,  1817,  he  left  Washington 
with  the  intention  of  visiting  and  inspecting  all  the  forts  and 
navy  yards  along  the  eastern  seaboard  and  the  Great  Lakes. 
Beginning  at  Baltimore,  he  went  to  New  York,  then  to  Boston, 
and  then  to  Portland ;  where  he  turned  westward,  and  crossing 
New  Hampshire  and  Vermont  to  Lake  Champlain,  made  his 
way  to  Ogdensburg,  where  he  took  a  boat  to  Sacketts  Harbor 
and  Niagara,  whence  he  went  to  Buffalo,  and  Detroit,  and  then 
back  to  Washington. 

Wherever  he  went,  the  people  came  by  thousands  to  greet 
him ;  but  nowhere  was  the  reception  so  hearty  as  in  New 
England,  the  stronghold  of  Federalism.  "The  visit  of  the 
President,"  said  a  Boston  newspaper,  "seems  wholly  to  have 
allayed  the  storms  of  party.  People  now  meet  in  the  same  'room 
who,  a  short  while  since,  ivould  scarcely  pass  along  the  same 
street"  Another  said  that  since  Monroe's  arrival  at  Boston 
"  party  feeling  and  animosities  have  been  laid  aside,  and  but 
one  great  national  feeling  has  animated  every  class  of  our  citi 
zens."  So  it  was  everywhere,  and  when,  therefore,  the  Boston 
Sentinel  called  the  times  the  "  era  of  good  feeling,"  the  whole 
country  took  up  the  expression  and  used  it,  and  the  eight  years 
of  Monroe's  administration  have  ever  since  been  so  called. 

294.  Trouble  with  the  Seminole  Indians.  —  Though  all  was 
quiet  and  happy  within  our  borders,  events  of  great  importance 
were  happening  along  our  northern,   western,   and   southern 
frontier.     During  the  war  with  England,  the  Creek  Indians  in 
Georgia  and  Alabama  had  risen  against  the  white  settlers  and 
were  beaten  arid  driven  out  by  Jackson  and  forced  to  take 


SETTLEMENT   OF   OUR   BOUNDARIES  261 

refuge  with  the  Seminoles  in  Florida.  As  they  had  been  the 
allies  of  England,  they  fully  expected  that  when  peace  was 
made,  England  would  secure  for  them  the  territory  of  which 
Jackson  had  deprived  them.  When  England  did  not  do  this, 
they  grew  sullen  and  savage,  and  in  1817  began  to  make  raids 
over  the  border,  run  off  cattle  and  murder  men,  women,  and 
children.  In  order  to  stop  these  depredations,  General  Jack 
son  was  sent  to  the  frontier,  and  utterly  disregarding  the  fact 
that  the  Creeks  and  Seminoles  were  on  Spanish  soil,  he  entered 
West  Florida,  took  St.  Marks  and  Pensacola,  destroyed  the 
Indian  power,  and  hanged  two  English  traders  as  spies.1 

295.  The  Canadian   Boundary;    Forty-ninth  Parallel. — This 
was  serious,  for  at  the  time  the  news  reached  Washington 
that   Jackson    had    invaded    Spanish   soil   and    hanged    two 
English  subjects,    important    treaties    were   under   way    with 
Spain  and  Great  Britain,  and  it  was  feared  his  violent  acts 
would   stop  them.      Happily  no  evil  consequences  followed, 
and  in  1818  an  agreement  was  reached  as  to  the  dividing  line 
between  the  United  States,  and  British  America. 

When  Louisiana  came  to  us,  no  limit  was  given  to  it  on  the 
north,  and  fifteen  years  had  been  allowed  to  pass  without 
attempting  to  establish  one.  Now,  however,  the  boundary 
was  declared  to  be  a  line  drawn  south  from  the  most  north 
western  point  of  the  Lake  of  the  Woods  to  the  forty-ninth 
parallel  of  north  latitude  and  along  this  parallel  to  the  summit 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

296.  Joint  Occupation  of  Oregon.  —  The  country  beyond  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  the  Oregon  country,  was  claimed  by  both 
England  and  the  United  States ;  so  it  was  agreed  in  the  treaty 
of  1818  that  for  ten  years  to  come  the  country  should  be  held 
in  joint  occupation. 

297.  The  Spanish  Boundary  Line.  —  One  year  later  (1819)  the 
boundary  of  Louisiana  was  completed  by  a  treaty  with  Spain, 
which  now  sold   us   East  and  West  Florida  for  $ 5,000,000. 

1  Parton's  Life  of  Jackson,  Chaps.  34-36 ;  McMaster's  History,  Vol. 
IV.,  pp.  430-456. 


262      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

Till  this  time  we  had  always  claimed  that  Louisiana  extended 
across  Texas  as  far  as  the  Rio  Grande.  By  the  treaty  this 
claim  was  given  up,  and  the  boundary  became  the  Sabine 
River  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  to  32°,  then  a  north  line  to  the 
Red  River;  westward  along  this  river  to  the  100th  meridian; 
then  northward  to  the  Arkansas  River,  and  westward  to  its 
source  in  the  Rocky  Mountains ;  then  a  north  line  to  42°,  and 
then  along  that  parallel  to  the  Pacific  Ocean.1 

298.  Russian  Claims  on  the  Pacific.  —  The  Oregon  country 
was  thus  restricted  to  42°  on  the  south,  and  though  it  had  no 
limit  on  the  north  the  Emperor  of  Russia  (in  1822)  undertook 
to  fix  one  at  51°,  which  he  declared  should  be  the  south  bound 
ary  of  Alaska.    Oregon  was  thus  to  extend  from  42°  to  51°,  and 
from  the  Rocky  Mountains  to  the  Pacific.    But  Russia  had  also 
founded  a  colony  in  California,  and  seemed  to  be  preparing  to 
shut  the  United  States  from  the  Pacific  coast.    Against  all  this 
John  Quincy  Adams,  then  Secretary  of  State,  protested,  telling 
the  Russian  minister  that  European  powers  no  longer  had  a 
right  to  plant  colonies  in  either  North  or  South  America. 

299.  The  Holy  Allies  and  the  South  American  Republics.  —  This 
was  a  new  doctrine,  and  while  the  United  States  and  Russia 
were  discussing  the  boundary  of  Oregon,  it  became  necessary 
to  make  another  declaration  regarding  the  rights  of  European 
powers  in  the  two  Americas. 

Ever  since  1793,  when  Washington  issued  his  proclamation 
of  neutrality  (p.  206),  the  policy  of  the  United  States  had  been 
to  take  no  part  in  European  wars,  nor  meddle  in  European 
politics.  This  had  been  asserted  repeatedly  by  Washington, 
Jefferson,  and  Monroe,2  and  during  all  the  wars  from  1793  to 
1815  had  been  carefully  adhered  to.  It  was  supposed,  of  course, 
that  if  we  did  not  meddle  in  the  affairs  of  the  Old  World  nations, 

1  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the   United  States,  Vol.  IV., 
pp.  457-480. 

2  See  Washington's  Farewell  Address;  Jefferson's  Inaugural  Address, 
March  4,  1801;  also  his  message  to  Congress,  Oct.   17,  1803;   Monroe's 
Inaugural  Address,  March  4,  1817,  and  messages,  Dec.  2,  1817,  Nov. 
17,  1818,  Nov.  14,  1020 ;  see  also  American  History  Leaflets,  No.  4. 


SETTLEMENT   OF   OUR   BOUNDARIES 


263 


NORTH  AMER1C 

AFTER 

1824 


they  would  not  interfere  in  affairs  over  here.     But  about  1822 
it  seemed  likely  that  they  would  interfere  very  seriously. 

Beginning  with  1810,  the  Spanish  colonies  of  Mexico  and 
South  America  (Chile,  Peru,  Buenos  Ayres,  Colombia)  rebelled, 
formed  republics,  and  in  1822  were  acknowledged  as  free  and 


264      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

independent  powers  by  the  United  States.  Spain,  after  vainly 
attempting  to  subdue  them,  appealed  for  help  to  the  powers 
of  Europe,  which  in  1815  had  formed  a  Holy  Alliance  for  the 
purpose  of  maintaining  monarchical  government.  For  a  while 
these  powers  (Russia,  Prussia,  Austria,  France)  held  aloof. 
But  in  1823  they  decided  to  help  Spain  to  get  back  her  old 
colonies,  and  invited  Great  Britain  to  attend  a  Congress  be 
fore  which  the  matter  was  to  be  discussed.  But  Great  Britain 
had  no  desire  to  see  the  little  republics  destroyed,  and  in  the 
summer  of  1823,  the  British  Prime  Minister  asked  the  Amer 
ican  minister  in  London  if  the  United  States  would  join  with 
England  in  a  declaration  warning  the  Holy  Allies  not  to  med 
dle  with  the  South  American  republics.  Thus,  just  at  the  time 
when  Adams  was  protesting  against  European  colonization  in 
the  Northwest,  England  suggested  a  protest  against  European 
meddling  in  the  affairs  of  Spanish  America.  The  opportunity 
was  too  good  to  be  lost,  and  Adams  succeeded  in  persuading 
President  Monroe  to  make  a  protest  in  behalf  of  the  nation 
against  both  forms  of  European  interference  in  American 
affairs.  Monroe  thought  it  best  to  make  the  declaration 
independent  of  Great  Britain,  and  in  his  annual  message  to 
Congress,  December  2,  1823,  he  announced  three  great  guiding 
principles  now  known  as  the 

300.    Monroe  Doctrine.  - 

1.  Taking  up  the  matter  in  dispute  with  Russia,  he  declared 

that  the  American  continents  were  no  longer  open  to 
colonization  by  European  nations. 

Referring  to  the  conduct  of  the  Holy  Allies,  he  said, 

2.  That  the  United  States  would  not  meddle  in  the  political 

affairs  of  Europe. 

3.  That  European  governments  must  not  extend  their  systen 

.  to  any  part  of  North  or  South  America,  nor  oppress,  1101 
in  any  other  manner  seek  to  control  the  destiny  of  an} 
of  the  nations  of  this  hemisphere.1 

1  McMaster's  With  the  Fathers,  pp.  1-54 ;  Tucker's  Monroe  Doctrine. 


SETTLEMENT  OF   OUR   BOUNDARIES 


265 


The  protest  was  effectual.  The  Holy  Allies  did  not  meddle 
in  South  American  affairs,  and  the  next  year  (1824)  Russia 
agreed  to  make  no  settlement  south  of  54°  40'. 

SUMMARY 

1.  At  the  presidential  election  of  1816  the  Federalist  party,  for  the  last 

time,  voted  for  a  presidential  candidate.    Party  politics  were  dead, 
and  the  "era  of  good  feeling"  opened. 

2.  Many  important  matters  which  were  not  settled  by  the  Treaty  of 

Ghent  were  disposed  of  : 

A.  The  forty- ninth  parallel  was  made  the   boundary  from  a 
point  south  of  the  Lake  of  the  Woods  to  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

B.  Oregon  was  held  in  joint  occupation. 

C.  The  line  54°  40'  was  established. 

3.  The  boundary  between  the  United  States  and  the  Spanish  possessions 

was  drawn,  and  Florida  was  acquired. 

4.  The  Monroe  doctrine  was  announced. 


J9e«M  o/  Jfte  Federalist 

Kna  c 
Disap 

party  

Monr 

.The' 
_,  f*i~~~~'i- 

PS 

(./reeK 
Drive 

Seminole  War    .     .     . 

Take 
After 

a 

ftpr 

a 

VTCC 

H 

Destr 

h 

0 

DO 

1818. 

H 

g 

1819. 

K 

The  boundaries  .     .     . 

a 

1818. 

^o 

1824. 

The  I 

TheS 

77ie  Monroe  Doctrine  .  • 

Propo 

Qr\n 

oOl 

The  IV 

End  of  the  European  war. 
Disappearance  of  old  party  issues. 
Monroe  elected  President, 
era  of  good  feeling." 

Creek  Indians  join  the  English. 
Driven  out  of  Alabama  by  Jackson. 
Take  refuge  with  Florida  Seminoles. 
After  the  war  rise  against  the  settlers  in 

Georgia. 
Destroyed  by  Jackson. 

Northern  boundary  of  Louisiana 
settled  to  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

Treaty  with  Spain  settled  the  south 
boundary  of  Louisiana. 

Joint  occupation  of  Oregon. 

North  boundary  of  Oregon  estab 
lished  at  54°  40'. 


The  South  American  republics. 

Proposal  of  the  Holy  Allies  to  reduce  the 

South  American  republics. 
The  Monroe  Doctrine  announced  (1823). 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE   RISING   WEST 

301.  Rush  into  the  West.  —  The  settlement  of  our  boundary 

disputes,  especially  with  Spain,  was  most  timely,  for  even 
then  people  were  hurrying  across  the  mountains  by  tens  of 
thousands,  and  building  up  new  states  in  the  Mississippi  val 
ley.  The  great  demand  for  ships  and  provisions,  which  from 
1793  to  1807  had  made  business  so  brisk,  had  kept  people  on 
the  seaboard  and  given  them  plenty  of  employment.  But 
after  1812,  and  particularly  after  1815,  trade,  commerce,  and 
business  on  the  seaboard  declined,  work  became  scarce,  and 
men  began  to  emigrate  to  the  West,  where  they  could  buy 
land  from  the  government  on  the  installment  plan,  and  where 
the  states  could  not  tax  their  farms  until  five  years  after  the 
government  had  given  them  a  title  deed.  Old  settlers  in  central 
New  York  declared  they  had  never  seen  so  many  teams  and 
sleighs,  loaded  with  women,  children,  and  household  goods, 
traveling  westward,  bound  for  Ohio,  which  was  then  but  an 
other  name  for  the  West. 

As  the  year  wore  away,  the  belief  was  expressed  that  when 
autumn  came  it  would  be  found  that  the  worst  was  over,  and 
that  the  good  times  expected  to  follow  peace  would  keep 
people  on  the  seaboard.  But  the  good  times  did  not  return. 
The  condition  of  trade  and  commerce,  of  agriculture  and 
manufactures,  grew  worse  instead  of  better,  and  the  western 
movement  of  population  became  greater  than  ever. 

302.  Rapid   Growth  of   Towns.  —  Fed  by  this  never-ending 
stream    of   newcomers,    the    West    was    almost    transformed. 
Towns  grew  and  villages  sprang  up  with  a  rapidity  which  even 

266 


THE   KISING   WEST  267 

in  these  days  of  rapid  and  easy  communication  would  be 
thought  amazing.  Mt.  Pleasant,  in  Jefferson  County,  Ohio, 
was  in  1810  a  little  hamlet  of  seven  families  living  in  cabins. 
In  18}5  it  contained  ninety  families,  numbering  500  souls. 
The  town  of  Vevay,  Ind.,  was  laid  out  in  1813,  and  was  not 
much  better  than  a  collection  of  huts  in  1814.  But  in  1816 
the  traveler  down  the  Ohio  who  stopped  at  Vevay  found  him 
self  at  a  nourishing  county  seat,  with  seventy-five  dwellings, 
occupied  by  a  happy  population  who  boasted  of  having  among 
them  thirty-one  mechanics  of  various  trades;  of  receiving 
three  mails  each  week,  and  supporting  a  weekly  newspaper 
called  the  Indiana  Register.  Forty-two  thousand  settlers  are 
said  to  have  come  into  Indiana  in  1816,  and  to  have  raised 
the  population  to  112,000. 

Letters  from  New  York  describe  the  condition  of  that  state 
west  of  Utica  as  one  of  astonishing  prosperity.  Log  cabins 
were  disappearing,  and  frame  and  brick  houses  taking  their 
place.  The  pike  from  Utica  to  Buffalo  was  almost  a  continu 
ous  village,  and  the  country  for  twenty  miles  on  either  side 
was  filling  up  with  an  industrious  population.  Auburn,  where 
twenty  years  before  land  sold  for  one  dollar  an  acre,  was  the 
first  town  in  size  and  wealth  west  of  Utica,  and  land  within 
its  limits  brought  $57000  an  acre.  Fourteen  miles  west  was 
Waterloo,  on  the  Seneca  River,  a  village  which  did  not  exist 
in  1814,  and  which  in  1816  had  fifty  houses.  Rochester,  the 
site  of  which  in  1815  was  a  wilderness,  had  a  printing  press, 
a  bookstore,  and  a  hundred  houses  in  1817. 1 

303.  Scenes  on  the  Western  Highways.  —  By  1817  this  migra 
tion  was  at  its  height,  and  in  the  spring  of  that  year  families 
set  forth  from  almost  every  village  and  town  on  the  seaboard. 
The  few  that  went  from  each  place  might  not  be  missed ;  but 
when  they  were  gathered  on  any  one  of  the  great  roads  to  the 
West,  as  that  across  New  York,  or  that  across  Pennsylvania, 
they  made  an  endless  procession  of  wagons  and  foot  parties. 

1  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  IV.,  pp. 
381-386. 


268      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUR   COUNTRY 

A  traveler  who  had  occasion  to  go  from  Nashville  to  Sa 
vannah  in  January,  1817,  declares  that  on  the  way  he  fell 
in  with  crowds  of  emigrants  from  Carolina  and  Georgia,  all 
bound  for  the  cotton  lands  of  Alabama ;  that  he  counted  the 
flocks  and  wagons,  and  that  —  carts,  gigs,  coaches,  and  wagons, 
all  told  —  there  were  207  conveyances,  and  more  than  3800 
people.  At  Haverhill,  in  Massachusetts,  a  train  of  sixteen 
wagons,  with  120  men,  women,  and  children,  from.  Durham, 
Me.,  passed  in  one  day.  They  were  bound  for  Indiana  to 
buy  a  township,  and  were  accompanied  by  their  minister. 
Within  thirteen  days,  seventy-three  wagons  and  450  emigrants 
had  passed  through  the  same  town  of  Haverhill.  At  Easton, 
Pa.,  which  lay  on  the  favorite  westward  route  for  New  Eng- 
landers,  511  wagons,  with  3066  persons,  passed  in  a  month. 
They  went  in  trains  of  from  six  to  fifty  wagons  each  day. 
The  keeper  of  Gate  No.  2,  on  the  Dauphin  turnpike,  in 
Pennsylvania,  returned  2001  families  as  having  passed  his 
gate,  bound  west,  between  March  and  December,  1817,  and 
gave  the  number  of  people  accompanying  the  vehicles  as 
16,000.  Along  the  New  York  route,  which  went  across  the 
state  from  Albany  to  Buffalo,  up  Lake  Erie,  and  on  by  way  of 
Chautauqua  Lake  to  the  Allegheny,  the  reports  are  just  as 
astonishing.  Two  hundred  and  sixty  wagons  were  counted 
going  by  one  tavern  in  nine  days,  besides  hundreds  of  people 
on  horseback  and  on  foot.1 

304.  Life  on  the  Frontier.  — The  "mover,"  or,  as  we  should 
say,  the  emigrant,  would  provide  himself  with  a  small  wagon, 
very  light,  but  strong  enough  to  carry  his  family,  provisions, 
bedding,  and  utensils;  would  cover  it  with  a  blanket  or  a 
piece  of  canvas  or  with  linen  which  was  smeared  with  tar 
inside  to  make  it  waterproof;  and  with  two  stout  horses  to 
pull  it,  would  set  out  for  the  West,  and  make  his  way  across 
Pennsylvania  to  Pittsburg,  then  the  greatest  city  of  the  West, 
with  a  population  of  7000.  Some,  as  of  old,  would  take  boats 
and  float  down  the  Ohio;  others  would  go  on  to  Wheeling, 
i  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  387,  388. 


Under  6  Inhabitant!  rr^i 

to  the  »q.  mile.       &22 

6  to  45  Inhabitants     ^^ 

to  the  «</.  mite         ^^ 


DISTRIBUTION 

OF  THE 

POPULATION  OP  THE  UNITED  STATE* 

FOURTH  CENSUS,  1820 


269 


270      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

ferried  across  the  river,  and  push  into  Ohio  or  Indiana  or 
llinois,  there  to  "  take  up "  a  quarter  section  (160  acres)  of 
government  land,  or  buy  or  rent  a  "  clearing  "  from  some  shift 
less  settler  of  an  earlier  day.  Government  land  intended  for 
sale  was  laid  out  in  quarter  sections  of  160  acres,  and  after 
being  advertised  for  a  certain  time  was  offered  for  sale  at 
public  auction.  What  was  not  sold  could  then  be  purchased 
at  the  land  office  of  the  district  at  two  dollars  an  acre,  one 
quarter  to  be  paid  down,  and  three  fourths  before  the  expira 
tion  of  four  years.  The  emigrant,  having  gathered  eighty 
dollars,  would  go  to  some  land  office,  "  enter  "  a  quarter  sec 
tion,  pay  the  first  installment,  and  make  his  way  in  the  two- 
horse  wagon  containing  his  family  and  his  worldly  goods  to 
the  spot  where  was  to  be  his  future  home.  Every  foot  of  it 
in  all  probability  would  be  covered  with  bushes  and  trees. 

305.  The  Log  Cabin.  —  In  that  case  the  settler  would  cut 
down  a  few  saplings,  make  a  "half -faced camp,"  and  begin  his 
clearing.  The  "half-faced  camp"  was  a  shed.  Three  sides 
were  of  logs  laid  one  on  another  horizontally.  The  roof  was 
of  saplings  covered  with  branches  or  bark.  The  fourth  side 
was  open,  and  when  it  rained  was  closed  by  hanging  up  deer 
skin  curtains.  In  this  camp  the  newcomer  and  his  family 
would  live  while  he  grubbed  up  the  bushes  and  cut  down  trees 
enough  to  make  a  log  cabin.  If  he  were  a  thrifty,  painstaking 
man,  he  would  smooth  each  log  on  four  sides  with  his  ax,  and 
notch  it  half  through  at  each  end  so  that  when  they  were 
placed  one  on  another  the  faces  would  nearly  touch.  Sap 
lings  would  make  the  rafters,  and  on  them  would  be  fastened 
planks  laid  clapboard  fashion,  or  possibly  split  shingles. 

An  opening  was  of  course  left  for  a  door,  although  many  a 
cabin  was  built  without  a  window,  and  when  the  door  was  shut 
received  no  light  save  that  which  came  down  the  chimney, 
which  was  always  on  the  outside  of  the  house.  To  form  it,  an 
opening  eight  feet  long  and  six  feet  high  was  left  at  one  end 
of  the  house,  and  around  this  a  sort  of  bay  window  was  built 
of  logs  and  lined  with  stones  on  the  inside.  Above  the  top  of 


THE   RISING   WEST 


271 


the  opening  the  chimney  contracted  and  was  made  of  branches 
smeared  both  inside  and  out  with  clay.  Generally  the  chim 
ney  went  to  the  peak  of  the  roof ;  but  it  was  by  no  means 
unusual  for  it  to  stop  about  halfway  up  the  end  of  the  cabin. 

If  the  settler  was  too  poor  to  buy  glass,  or  if  glass  could 
not  be  had,  the  window  frame  was  covered  with  greased  paper, 
which  let  in  the  light  but  could  not  be  seen  through.  The 
door  was  of  plank  with  leather  hinges,  or  with  iron  hinges 


made  from  an  old  wagon  tire  by  the  nearest  blacksmith  or  by 
the  settler  himself.  There  was  no  knob,  no  lock,  no  bolt. 
In  place  of  them  there  was  a  wooden  latch  on  the  inside, 
which  could  be  lifted  by  a  person  on  the  outside  of  the  door 
by  a  leather  strip  which  came  through  a  hole  in  the  door 
and  hung  down.  When  this  latchstring  was  out,  anybody 
could  pull  it,  lift  the  latch,  and  come  in.  When  it  was  drawn 
inside,  nobody  could  come  in  without  knocking.  The  floor 
was  made  of  "  puncheons,"  or  planks  split  and  hewn  with  an 

1  The  birthplace  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  restored  (reproduced,  together 
with  the  first  picture  on  the  next  page,  from  Tarbell's  Early  Life  of  Abra 
ham  Lincoln,  by  permission  of  the  publishers,  S.  S.  McClure,  Limited"*. 


272      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 


»•—  ^,3         Hand  mill 

roasted  by  hanging  them  with 
before  the  open  fire.      Cooking 
unknown,    and   all  cooking  was 
"Dutch  oven,"  on  the  hearth, 
or  in  a  clay  "  out  oven  "  built, 
as  its   name  implies,  out  of 
doors. 

306,  Clearing  and 
Planting.  —  The  land 
about  the  cabin  was 
cleared  by  grubbing  the 
bushes  and  cutt in  g  down 
trees  under  a  foot  in 
diameter  and  burning 
them.  Big  trees  were 


ax  from  the  trunk  of  a  tree, 
and  laid  with  the  round  side 
down.  The  furniture  the 
settler  brought  with  him,  or 
made  on  the  spot. 

The     household     utensils 
were  of  the  simplest  kind. 
Brooms    and    brushes   were 
made  of  corn  husks.     Corn 
was  shelled  by  hand  and  was 
then  either  carried  in  a  bag 
slung  over  a  horse's  back  to 
the    nearest    mill,     perhaps 
fifteen  miles  away,  or  was 
pounded  in  a  wooden  hom 
iny   mortar   with  a 
wooden    pestle,     or 
ground   in   a  hand 
mill.         Chickens 
and    game    were 
leather    strings 
stoves  were 
done  in  a 


Corn-husk  broom1 


Kitchen  utensils  l 


From  originals  in  the  National  Museum,  Washington. 


THI-:    RISING    WEST 


273 


"deadened,"  or  killed,  by  cutting  a  "girdle"  around  them  two 
or  three  feet  above  the  ground,  deep  enough  to  destroy  the  sap 
vessels  and  so  prevent  the  growth  of  leaves.1 

In  the  ground  thus  laid  open  to  the  sun  were  planted  corn, 
potatoes,  or  wheat,  which,  when  harvested,  was  threshed  with 
a  flail  and  fanned  and  cleaned  with  a  sheet.  At  first  the 
crop  would  be  scarcely  sufficient  for  home  use.  But,  as 
time  passed,  there  would  be  some  to  spare,  and  this  would  be 
wagoned  to  some  river  town  and  sold  or  exchanged  for  "  store 
goods." 

If  the  settler  chose  his  farm  wisely,  others  would  soon  settle 
near  by,  and  when  a  cluster  of  clearings  had  been  made,  some 
enterprising  speculator  would  appear,  take  up  a  quarter  sec 
tion,  cut  it  into  town  lots,  and  call  the  place  after  himself,  as 
Piketown,  or  Leesburg,  or  Gentryville.  A  storekeeper  with 
a  case  or  two  of  goods  would  next  appear,  then  a  tavern  would 
be  erected,  and  possibly  a  blacksmith  shop  and  a  mill,  and 
Piketown  or  Leesburg  would  be  established.  Hundreds  of 
such  ventures  failed;  but  hundreds  of  others  succeeded  and 
are  to-day  prosperous  villages. 


Mississippi  produce  boat2 

307.  The  New  States.  —  While  the  northern  stream  of  popu 
lation  was  thus  traveling  across  New  York,  northern  Ohio, 
Indiana,  Illinois,  and  into  Michigan,  the  middle  stream  was 
pushing  down  the  Ohio.  By  1820  it  had  greatly  increased 
the  population  of  southern  Indiana  and  Illinois,  and  crossing 

1  For  a  delightful  account  of  life  in  the  West,  read  W.  C.  Howells's 
Recollections  of  Life  in  Ohio  (edited  by  his  son,  William  Dean  Howells). 

2  From  a  model  in  the  National  Museum  at  Washington. 

McM.  HIST.  — 16 


274      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR  COUNTRY 

the  Mississippi  was  going  up  the  Missouri  River.  In  the 
South  the  destruction  of  the  Indian  power  by  Jackson  in 
1813,  and  the  opening  of  the  Indian  land  to  settlement,  led  to 
a  movement  of  the  southern  stream  of  population  across  Ala 
bama  to  Mobile.  Now,  what  were  some  of  the  results  of 
this  movement  of  population  into  the  Mississippi  valley?  In 
the  first  place,  it  caused  the  formation  and  admission  into  the 
Union  of  six  states  in  five  years.  They  were  Indiana,  1816; 
Mississippi,  1817;  Illinois,  1818;  Alabama,  1819;  Maine, 
1820;  Missouri,  1821. 

308.  Slave  and  Free  States.  —  In  the  second  place,  it  brought 
about  a  great  struggle  over  slavery.  You  remember  that 
when  the  thirteen  colonies  belonged  to  Great  Britain  slavery 
existed  in  all  of  them;  that  when  they  became  independent 
states  some  began  to  abolish  slavery;  and  that  in  time  five 
became  free  states  and  eight  remained  slave  states.  Slavery 
was  also  gradually  abolished  in  New  York  and  New  Jersey, 
so  that  of  the  original  thirteen  only  six  were  now  to  be 
counted  as  slave  states.  You  remember  again  that  when 
the  Continental  Congress  passed  the  Ordinance  of  1787  for 
the  government  of  the  territory  lying  between  the  Ohio 
River  and  the  Great  Lakes,  Pennsylvania  and  the  Missis 
sippi  River,  it  ordained  that  in  the  Northwest  Territory 
there  should  be  no  slavery.  In  consequence  of  this,  Ohio, 
Indiana,  and  Illinois  were  admitted  into  the  Union  as  free 
states,  as  Vermont  had  been.  Kentucky  was  originally  part  of 
Virginia,  and  when  it  was  admitted,  came  in  as  a  slave  state. 
Tennessee  once  belonged  to  North  Carolina,  and  hence  was  also 
slave  soil ;  and  when  it  was  given  to  the  United  States,  the  con 
dition  was  imposed  by  North  Carolina  that  it  should  remain 
so.  Tennessee,  therefore,  entered  the  Union  (in  1796)  as  a 
slave  state.  Much  of  what  is  now  Alabama  and  Mississippi 
was  once  owned  by  Georgia,  and  when  she  ceded  it  in.  1802, 
she  did  so  with  the  express  condition  that  it  should  remain 
slave  soil;  as  a  result  of  this,  Alabama  and  Mississippi 
were  slave  states.  Louisiana  was  part  of  the  Louisiana 


THE   RISING   WEST  275 

Purchase,  and  was  admitted  (1812)  as  a  slave  state  because 
it  contained  a  great  many  slaves  at  the  time  of  the  purchase. 

Thus  in  1820  there  were  twenty-two  states  in  the  Union,  of 
which  eleven  were  slave,  and  eleven  free.  Notice  now  two 
things  :  1.  That  the  dividing  line  between  the  slave  and  the 
free  states  was  the  south  and  west  boundary  of  Pennsylvania 
from  the  Delaware  to  the  Ohio,  and  the  Ohio  River  ;  2.  That 
all  the  states  in  the  Union  except  part  of  Louisiana  lay  east  of 
the  Mississippi  River.  As  to  what  should  be  the  character 
of  our  country  west  of  that  river,  nothing  had  as  yet  been  said, 
because  as  yet  no  state  lying  wholly  in  that  region  had  asked 
admittance  to  the  Union. 

309.  Shall  there   be   Slave   States  West  of   the    Mississippi 
River  ?  —  But   when  the   people   rushed   westward   after  the 
war,  great  numbers  crossed  the  Mississippi  and  settled  on  the 
Missouri  River,  and  as  they  were  now  very  numerous  they 
petitioned  Congress  in  1818  for  leave  to  make  the  state  of 
Missouri  and  to  be  admitted  into  the  Union. 

The  petitioners  did  not  say  whether  they  would  make  a  slave 
or  a  free  state ;  but  as  the  Missourians  owned  slaves,  everybody 
knew  that  Missouri  would  be  a  slave  state.  To  this  the  free 
states  were  opposed.  If  the  tobacco-growing,  cotton-raising, 
and  sugar-making  states  wanted  slaves,  that  was  their  affair; 
but  slavery  must  not  be  extended  into  states  beyond  the 
Mississippi,  because  it  was  wrong.  No  man,  it  was  said,  had 
any  right  to  buy  and  sell  a  human  being,  even  if  he  was  black. 

The  Southern  people  were  equally  determined  that  slavery 
should  cross  the  Mississippi.  We  cannot,  said  they,  abolish 
slavery ;  because  if  our  slaves  were  set  free,  they  would  not 
work,  and  as  they  are  very  ignorant,  they  would  take  our 
property  and  perhaps  our  lives.  Neither  can  we  stop  the 
increase  of  negro  slave  population.  We  must,  then,  have 
some  place  to  send  our  surplus  slaves,  or  the  present  slave 
states  will  become  a  black  America. 

310.  The  Missouri  Compromise.  —  Each  side  was  so  deter 
mined,  and  it  was  so  clear  that  neither  would  yield,  that  a  com- 


276      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 


promise  was  suggested.  The  country  east  of  the  Mississippi, 
it  was  said,  is  partly  slave,  partly  free  soil.  Why  not  divide 
the  country  west  of  the  great  river  in  the  same  way  ?  At 
first  the  North  refused.  But  it  so  happened  that  just  at  this 
moment  Maine,  having  secured  the  consent  of  Massachusetts, 
applied  to  Congress  for  admission  into  the  Union  as  a  free 
state.  The  South,  which  had  control  of  the  Senate,  thereupon 
said  to  the  North,  which  controlled  the  House  of  Representa 
tives,  If  you  will  not  admit  Missouri  as  a  slave  state,  we  will 
not  admit  Maine  as  a  free  state.  This  forced  the  compromise, 
and  after  a  bitter  and  angry  discussion  it  was  agreed 

1.  That  Maine  should  come  in  as  a  free,  and  Missouri  as  a 

slave,  state. 

2.  That  the  Louisiana  Purchase  should  be  cut  in  two  by  the 

parallel  of  36°  30',  and  that  all  north  of  the  line  except 
Missouri  should  be  free  soil.1  This  parallel  was  there 
after  known  as  the  "  Missouri  Compromise  Line." 


1  The  Compromise  was  violated  in  1836,  when  the  present  northwest 
corner  of  Missouri  was  taken  from  the  free  territory  and  added  to  that 
state.  See  maps,  pp.  299  and  348. 


THE   RISING   WEST  277 

The  admission  of  Maine  and  Missouri  raised  the  number  of 
states  to  twenty-four.1  2s"o  more  were  admitted  for  sixteen 
years.  When  Missouri  applied  for  admission  as  a  state, 
Arkansas  was  (1819)  organized  as  a  territory. 

311.  The  Second  Election  of  Monroe.  —  This  bitter  contest 
over  the  exclusion  of  slavery  from  the  country  west  of  the 
Mississippi  shows  how  completely  party  lines  had  disappeared 
in  1820.  In  the  course  of  that  year,  electors  of  a  President 
were  to  be  chosen  in  the  twenty-four  states.  That  slavery 
would  play  an  important  part  in  the  campaign,  and  that  some 
candidate  would  be  put  in  the  field  by  the  people  opposed  to 
the  compromise,  might  have  been  expected.  But  there  was  no 
campaign,  no  contest,  no  formal  nomination.  The  members 
of  Congress  held  a  caucus,  but  decided  to  nominate  nobody. 
Every  elector,  it  was  well  known,  would  be  a  Republican,  and 
as  such  would  vote  for  the  reelection  of  Monroe  and  Tompkins. 
And  this  almost  did  take  place.  Every  one  of  the  229  electors 
who  voted  was  a  Republican,  and  all  save  one  in  New  Hamp 
shire  cast  votes  for  Monroe.  But  this  one  man  gave  his  vote 
to  John  Quincy  Adams.  He  said  he  did  not  want  Washington 
to  be  robbed  of  the  glory  of  being  the  only  President  who  had 
ever  received  the  unanimous  vote  of  the  electors. 

March  4,  1821,  came  on  Sunday.  Monroe  was  therefore 
inaugurated  on  Monday,  March  5. 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  dull  times  on  the  seaboard,  the  cheap  land  in  the  West,  the  love 

of  adventure,  and  the  desire  to  "  do  better"  led,  during  1814-1820, 
to  a  most  astonishing  emigration  westward. 

2.  The  rush  of  population  into  the  Mississippi  valley  caused  the  admis 

sion  of  six  states  into  the  Union  between  1816  and  1821. 

3.  The  question  of  the  admission  of  Missouri  brought  up  the  subject  of 

shutting  slavery  out  of  the  country  west  of  the  Mississippi,  which 
ended  in  a  compromise  and  the  establishment  of  the  line  36°  30'. 

1  For  the  compromise  read  Woodburn's  Historical  Significance  of 
the  Missouri  Compromise  (in  Eeport  American  Historical  Association, 
1893,  pp.  251-297)  ;  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United 
States,  Vol.  IV.,  Chap.  39. 


278      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR  COUNTRY 


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CHAPTER   XXII 

THE  HIGHWAYS  OF  TRADE  AND  COMMERCE 

312.    Improvement  in  Means  of  Travel.  —  We  have  now  con 
sidered  two  of  the  results  of  the  rush  of  population  from  the 


Bordentown,  N.J.1 

seaboard  to  the  Mississippi  valley;  namely,  the  admission  of 
five  new  Western  states  into  the  Union,  and  the  struggle  over 
the  extension  of  slavery,  which  resulted  in  the  Missouri  Com 
promise.  Bat  there  was  a  third  result,  — the  actual  construc 
tion  of  highways  of  transportation  connecting  the  East  with  the 
West.  Along  the  seaboard,  during  the  five  years  which  fol 
lowed  the  war,  great  improvements  were  made  in  the  means  of 

1  From  an  old  engraving.    Passengers  from  Philadelphia  landed  here 
from  the  steamboat  and  took  stage  for  New  Brunswick. 

279 


280      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 


travel.  The  steamboat  had  come  into  general  use,  and.  thanks 
to  this  and  to  good  roads  and  bridges,  people  could  travel 
from  Philadelphia  to  New  York  between  sunrise  and  sunset 
on  a  summer  day,  and  from  New  York  to  Boston  in  forty  - 
eight  hours.  The  journey  from  Boston  to  Washington  was 
now  finished  in  four  days  and  six  hours,  and  from  New  York 
to  Quebec  in  eight  days. 

In  the  West  there  was  much  the  same  improvement.  The 
Mississippi  and  Ohio  swarmed  with  steamboats,  which  came 
up  the  river  from  New  Orleans  to  St.  Louis  in  twenty-five 


days  and  went  down  with  the  current  in  eight.  Little,  how 
ever,  had  been  done  to  connect  the  East  with  the  West.  Until 
the  appearance  of  the  steamboat  in  1812,  the  merchants  of 
Pittsburg,  Cincinnati,  Louisville,  and  a  host  of  other  towns 
in  the  interior  bought  the  produce  of  the  Western  settlers,  and 
floating  it  down  the  Ohio  and  the  Mississippi  sold  it  at  New 
Orleans  for  cash,  and  with  the  money  purchased  goods  at  Bal 
timore,  Philadelphia,  and  New  York,  and  carried  them  over  the 
mountains  to  the  West.  Some  went  in  sailing  vessels  up  the 
Hudson  from  New  York  to  Albany,  were  wagoned  to  the  Falls 
of  the  Mohawk,  and  then  loaded  in  "Schenectady  boats," 


HIGHWAYS   OF  TRADE   AND   COMMERCE 


281 


Boats  on  the  Mohawk1 

which  were  pushed  up  the  Mohawk  by  poles  to  Utica,  and 
then  by  canal  and  river  to  Oswego,  on  Lake  Ontario.  From 
Oswego  they  went  in  sloops  to  Lewiston  on  the  Niagara  Kiver, 
whence  they  were  carried  in  ox  wagons  to  Buffalo,  and  then 
in  sailing  vessels  to  Westfield,  and  by  Chautauqua  Lake  and 
the  Allegheny  Eiver  to  Pittsburg.  Goods  from  Philadelphia 
and  Baltimore  were  hauled  in  great  Conestoga  wagons  drawn 
by  four  and  six  horses  across  the  mountains  to  Pittsburg.  The 


R 


THOMAS  HARPER, 

AGEKT  FOR 

INLAND  TRANSPORTATION, 

BCEIVES  at  hit  Store,  No.  467,  Market,  above  Twelfth  street,  MERCHANDIZE  intended  for 
rmtbwff.  and  any  of  the  town*  on  the  main  road*  leading  thereto.     And  for  ,tll  the  principal 
n  the  Southern.  We.tern  or  Ea.tern  State*,  which  are  forwarded  with  the  utmost  care,  and  on  the 
reasonable  term*.    The  convenience  of  an  establishment  where  single  packages  or  larger  parcel* 
be  dispatched  without  delay,  has  been  loog  wanted  io  tbii  chj.    The  obvioui  utility  of  h  therefore 
requires  no  comment 

owrch  14  ^j, 

Prom  the  Philadelphia  American  Daily  Advertiser 
1  From  an  old  print. 


282      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR   COUNTRY 


carrying  trade  alone  in  these  ways  was  immense.  More  than 
12,000  wagons  came  to  Pittsburg  in  a  year,  bringing  goods 
on  which  the  freight  was  $1,500,000. 

With  the  appearance  of  the  steamboat  on  the  Mississippi  and 
Ohio,  this  trade  was  threatened;  for  the  people  of  the  Western 
States  could  now  float  their  pork,  flour,  and  lumber  to  New 
Orleans  as  before,  and  bring  back  from  that  city  by  steamboat 
the  hardware,  pottery,  dry  goods,  cotton,  sugar,  coffee,  tea, 
which  till  then  they  had  been  forced  to  buy  in  the  East.1 

This  new  way  of  trading  was  so  much  cheaper  than  the  old, 
that  it  was  clear  to  the  people  of  the  Eastern  States  that  unless 
they  opened  up  a  still  cheaper  route  to  the  West,  their  West 
ern  trade  was  gone. 


The  Erie  Canal 

313.  The  Erie  Canal.  — In  1817  the  people  of  Kew  York 
determined  to  provide  such  a  route,  and  in  that  year  they  began 
to  cut  a  canal  across  the  state  from  the  Hudson  at  Albany  to 
Lake  Erie  at  Buffalo.  To  us,  with  our  steam  shovels  and 
drills,  our  great  derricks,  our  dynamite,  it  would  be  a  small 
matter  to  dig  a  ditch  4  feet  deep,  40  feet  wide,  and  363  miles 
long.  But  on  July  4,  1817,  when  Governor  De  Witt  Clinton 
turned  the  first  sod,  and  so  began  the  work,  it  was  considered 
a  great  undertaking,  for  the  men  of  those  days  had  only  picks, 
shovels,  wheelbarrows,  and  gunpowder  to  do  it  with. 

1  McMaster's  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  IV.,  pp. 
397-410,  419-421. 


HIGHWAYS   OF   TRADE   AND   COMMERCE  283 

Opposition  to  the  canal  was  strong.  Some  declared  that  it 
would  swallow  up  millions  of  dollars  and  yield  no  return,  and 
nicknamed  it  "  Clinton's  Big  Ditch."  But  Clinton  was  not 
the  kind  of  man  that  is  afraid  of  ridicule.  He  and  his 
friends  went  right  on  with  the  work,  and  after  eight  years 
spent  in  cutting  down  forests,  in  blasting  rocks,  in  building 
embankments  to  carry  the  canal  across  swamps,  and  high  aque 
ducts  to  carry  it  over  the  rivers,  and  locks  of  solid  masonry 
to  enable  the  boats  to  go  up  and  down  the  sides  of  hills,  the 
canal  was  finished.1 

Then,  one  day  in  the  autumn  of  1825,  a  fleet  of  boats  set 
off  from  Buffalo,  passed  through  the  canal  to  Albany,  where 


Model  of  a  canal  packet  boat 

Governor  De  Witt  Clinton  boarded  one  of  them,  and  went 
down  the  Hudson  to  New  York.  A  keg  of  water  from  Lake 
Erie  was  brought  along,  and  this,  when  the  fleet  reached  New 
York  Harbor,  Clinton  poured  with  great  ceremony  into  the 
bay,  to  commemorate,  as  he  said,  "  the  navigable  communica 
tion  opened  between  our  Mediterranean  seas  [the  Great  Lakes] 
and  the  Atlantic  Ocean." 

314.  Effect  of  the  Erie  Canal.— The  building  of  the  canal 
changed  the  business  conditions  of  about  half  of  our  country. 
Before  the  canal  was  finished,  goods,  wares,  merchandise, 
going  west  from  New  York,  were  carried  from  Albany  to 
Buffalo  at  a  cost  of  $120  a  ton.  After  the  canal  was  opened, 
it  cost  but  $14  a  ton  to  carry  freight  from  Albany  to  Buffalo. 
This  was  most  important.  In  the  first  place,  it  enabled  the 
people  in  New  York,  in  Ohio,  in  Indiana,  in  Illinois,  and  all 
over  the  West,  to  buy  plows  and  hoes  and  axes  and  clothing 

1  McMaster's  History,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  415-418. 


284      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUK   COUNTRY 

and  food  and  medicine  for  a  much  lower  price  than  they 
had  formerly  paid  for  such  things.  Life  in  the  West  became 
more  comfortable  and  easy  than  ever  before. 

In  the  next  place,  the  Eastern  merchant  could  greatly  extend 
his  business.  How  far  west  he  could  send  his  goods  depended 
on  the  expense  of  carrying  them.  When  the  cost  was  high, 
they  could  go  but  a  little  way  without  becoming  so  expensive 
that  only  a  few  people  could  buy  them.  After  1825,  when  the 
Erie  Canal  made  transportation  cheap,  goods  from  New  York 
city  could  be  sold  in  Michigan  and  Missouri  at  a  much  lower 
price  than  they  had  before  been  sold  in  Pittsburg  or  Buffalo. 

315.  New  York  City  the  Metropolis.  —  The  New  York  mer 
chant,  in  other  words,  now  had  the  whole  West  for  his  market. 
That  city,  which  till  1820  had  been  second  in  population,  and 
third  in  commerce,  rushed   ahead   and   became   the  first   in 
population,  commerce,  and  business. 

The  same  was  true  of  New  York  state.  As  the  canal  grew 
nearer  and  nearer  completion,  the  people  from  other  states 
came  in  and  settled  in  the  towns  and  villages  along  the  route, 
bought  farms,  and  so  improved  the  country  that  the  value  of 
the  land  along  the  canal  increased  $100,000,000. 

A  rage  for  canals  now  spread  over  the  country.  Many  were 
talked  of,  but  never  started.  Many  were  started,  but  never 
finished.  Such  as  had  been  begun  were  hurried  to  comple 
tion.  Before  1830  there  were  1343  miles  of  canal  open  to  use 
in  the  United  States. 

316.  The  Pennsylvania  Highway  to  the  West.  —  In  Pennsyl 
vania  the  opening  of  the  Erie  Canal  caused  great  excitement. 
And  well  it  might;  for  freight  could  now  be  sent  by  sailing 
vessels  from  Philadelphia  to  Albany,  and  then  by  canal  to 
Buffalo,  and  on  by  the  Lake  Erie  and  Chautauqua  route  to 
Pittsburg,  for  one  third 'what  it  cost  to  go  overland.    It  seemed 
as  if  New  York  by  one  stroke  had  taken  away  the  Western 
commerce  of  Philadelphia,  and  ruined  the  prosperity  of  such 
inland  towns  of  Pennsylvania  as  lay  along  the  highway  to  the 
West.     The  demand  for  roads  and  canals  at  state  expense  was 


HIGHWAYS  OF   TRADE   AND   COMMERCE  285 

now  listened  to,  and  in  1826  ground  was  broken  at  Harrisburg 
for  a  system  of  canals  to  join  Philadelphia  and  Pittsburg. 
But  in  1832  the  horse-power  railroad  came  into  use,  and  when 
finished,  the  system  was  part  railroad  and  part  canal. 

317.  The  Baltimore  Route  to  the  West.  — This  energy  on  the 
part  of  Pennsylvania  alarmed  the  people  of  Baltimore.    Unless 
their  city  was  to  yield  its  Western  trade  to  Philadelphia  they 
too  must  have  a  speedy  and  cheap  route  to  the  West.    In  1827, 
therefore,  a  great  public  meeting  was  held  at  Baltimore  to  con 
sider  the  wisdom  of  building  a  railroad  from  Baltimore  to  some 
point  on  the  Ohio  Kiver.     The  meeting  decided  that  it  must  be 
done,  and  on  July  4, 1828,  the  work  of  construction  was  begun. 
In  1830  the  road  was  opened  as  far  as  Ellicotts  Mills,  a  dis 
tance  of  fifteen  miles.     The  cars  were  drawn  by  horses. 

The  early  railroads,  as  the  word  implies,  were  roads  made 
of  wooden  rails,  or  railed  roads,  over  which  heavy  loads  were 
drawn  by  horses.  The  very  first  were  private  affairs,  and  not 
intended  for  carrying  passengers.1 

318.  Public  Railroads.  — In  1825  John  Stevens,  who  for  ten 
years  past  had  been  advocating  steam  railroads,  built  a  circular 
road  at  Hoboken  to  demonstrate  the  possibility  of  using  such 
means  of  locomotion.     In  1823  Pennsylvania  chartered  a  com 
pany  to  build  a  railroad  from  Philadelphia  to  the  Susquehanna. 
But  it  was  not  till  1827,  when  the  East  was  earnestly  seeking 
for  a  rapid  and  cheap  means  of  transportation  to  the  West, 
that  railroads  of  great  length  and  for  public  use  were  under 
taken.     In  that   year  the   people  of  Massachusetts  were  so 
excited  over  the  opening  of  the  Erie  Canal  that  the  legislature 

1  The  first  was  used  in  1807  at  Boston  to  carry  earth  from  a  hilltop  to 
a  street  that  was  being  graded.  The  second  was  built  near  Philadelphia 
in  1810,  and  ran  from  a  stone  quarry  to  a  dock.  It  was  in  use  twenty- 
eight  years.  The  third  was  built  in  1826,  and  extended  from  the  granite 
quarries  at  Quincy,  Mass.,  to  the  Neponset  River,  a  distance  of  three 
miles.  The  fourth  was  from  the  coal  mines  of  Mauchchunk,  Pa.,  to 
the  Lehigh  River,  nine  miles.  The  fifth  was  constructed  in  1828  by  the 
Delaware  and  Hudson  Canal  Company  to  carry  coal  from  the  mines  to 
the  canal. 


286      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

appointed  a  commission  and  an  engineer  to  select  a  line  for  a 
railroad  to  join  Boston  and  Albany. 

At  this  time  there  was  no  such  thing  as  a  steam  locomotive 
in  use  in  the  United  States.  The  first  ever  used  here  for 
practical  purposes  was  built  in  England  and  brought  to  New 
York  city  in  1829,  and  in  August  of  that  year  made  a  trial  trip 
on  the  rails  of  the  Delaware  and  Hudson  Canal  Company. 
The  experiment  was  a  failure ;  and  for  several  years  horses 
were  the  only  motive  power  in  use  on  the  railroads.  In  1830, 
however,  the  South  Carolina  Railroad  having  finished  six  miles 
of  its  road,  had  a  locomotive  built  in  New  York  city,  and  in 
January,  1831,  placed  it  on  the  tracks  at  Charleston.  Another 
followed  in  February,  and  the  era  of  locomotive  railroading  in 
our  country  began. 

319.  The  Portage  Railroad.  —  As  yet  the  locomotive  was  a 
rude  machine.  It  could  not  go  faster  than  fifteen  miles  an 
hour,  nor  climb  a  steep  hill.  Where  such  an  obstacle  was  met 
with,  either  the  road  went  around  it,  or  the  locomotive 
was  taken  off  and  the  cars  were  let  down  or  pulled  up  the 
hill  on  an  inclined  plane  by  means  of  a  rope  and  stationary 
engine.1  When  Pennsylvania  began  her  railroad  over  the 
Alleghany  Mountains,  therefore,  she  used  the  inclined-plane 
system  on  a  great  scale,  so  that  in  its  time  the  Portage  Kail- 
road,  as  it  was  called,  was  the  most  remarkable  piece  of  rail 
roading  in  the  world. 

The  Pennsylvania  line  to  the  West  consisted  of  a  horse 
railroad  from  Philadelphia  to  Columbia  on  the  Susquehanna 
River ;  of  a  canal  out  the  Juniata  valley  to  Hollidaysburg  on 
the  eastern  slope  of  the  Alleghany  Mountains,  where  the 
Portage  Railroad  began,  and  the  cars  were  raised  to  the  sum 
mit  of  the  mountains  by  a  series  of  inclined  planes  and  levels, 
and  then  by  the  same  means  let  down  the  western  slope  to 

1  Such  an  inclined  plane  existed  at  Albany,  where  passengers  were 
pulled  up  to  the  top  of  the  hill.  Another  was  at  Belmont  on  the  Schuyl- 
kill  River  in  Philadelphia,  and  another  on  the  Paterson  and  Hudson 
road  near  Paterson. 


HIGHWAYS  OF  TRADE  AND   COMMERCE 


287 


Johnstown;   and  then  of  another  canal  from  Johnstown  to 
Pittsburg. 

As  originally  planned,  the  state  was  to  build  the  railroad 
and  canal,  just  as  it  built  turnpikes.  No  cars,  no  motive  power 
of  any  sort,  except  at  the  inclined  planes,  were  to  be  supplied. 
Anybody  could  use  it  who  paid  two  cents  a  mile  for  each 
passenger,  and  $4.92  for  each  car  sent  over  the  rails.  At  first, 


Inclined  plane  at  Belmont  in  1835 

therefore,  firms  and  corporations  engaged  in  the  transportation 
business  owned  their  own  cars,  their  own  horses,  employed 
their  own  drivers,  and  charged  such  rates  as  the  state  tolls 
and  sharp  competition  would  allow.  The  result  was  dire  con 
fusion.  The  road  was  a  single-track  affair,  with  turnouts  to 
enable  cars  coming  in  opposite  directions  to  pass  each  other. 
But  the  drivers  were  an  unruly  set,  paid  no  attention  to  turn 
outs,  and  would  meet  face  to  face  on  the  track,  just  as  if  no 
turnouts  existed.  A  fight  or  a  block  was  sure  to  follow,  and 


288      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

somebody  was  forced  to  go  back.  To  avoid  this,  the  road  was 
double-tracked  in  1834,  when,  for  the  first  time,  two  loco 
motives  dragging  long  trains  of  cars  ran  over  the  line  from 
Lancaster  to  Philadelphia.  As  the  engine  went  faster  than 
the  horses,  it  soon  became  apparent  that  both  conld  not  use 
the  road  at  the  same  time ;  and  after  1836  steam  became  the 
sole  motive  power,  and  the  locomotive  was  furnished  by  the 
state,  which  now  charged  for  hauling  the  cars.1 

The  puffing  little  locomotive  bore  little  resemblance  to  its 
beautiful  and  powerful  successors.  No  cab  sheltered  the  engi 
neer,  no  brake  checked  the  speed,  wood  was  the  only  fuel,  and 
the  tall  smokestack  belched  forth  smoke  and  red-hot  cinders. 


The  first  railroad  train  in  New  Jersey  (1831) 

But  this  was  nothing  to  what  happened  when  the  train  came  to 
a  bridge.  Such  structures  were  then  protected  by  roofing  them 
and  boarding  the  sides  almost  to  the  eaves.  But  the  roof  was 
always  too  low  to  allow  the  smokestack  to  go  under.  The 
stack,  therefore,  was  jointed,  and  when  passing  through  a 
bridge  the  upper  half  was  dropped  down  and  the  whole  train 
in  consequence  was  enveloped  in  a  cloud  of  smoke  and  burning 
cinders,  while  the  passengers  covered  their  eyes,  mouths,  and 
noses. 

320.  Railroads  in  1 835.  —  In  1835  there  were  twenty-two  rail 
roads  in  operation  in  the  United  States.  Two  were  west  of 
the  Alleghanies,  and  not  one  was  140  miles  long.  For  a  while 
the  cars  ran  on  "  strap  rails  "  made  of  wooden  beams  or  stringers 
laid  on  stone  blocks  and  protected  on  the  top  surface,  where  the 

1  On  the  early  railroads  see  Brown's  History  of  the  First  Locomotives 
in  America. 


HIGHWAYS   OF   TRADE   AND   COMMERCE  289 

car  wheel  rested,  by  long  strips  or  straps  of  iron  spiked  on. 
The  spikes  would  often  work  loose,  and,  as  the  car  passed 
over,  the  strap  would  curl  up  and  come  through  the  bottom  of 
the  car,  making  what  was  called  a  snake  head.  It  was  some 
time  before  the  all-iron  rail  came  into  use,  and  even  then  it 
was  a  small  affair  compared  with  the  huge  rails  that  are  used 
at  present. 

321.  Mechanical  Inventions.  —  The  introduction  of  the  steam 
boat  and  the  railroad,  the  great  development  of  manufactures, 
the  growth  of  the  West,  and  the  immense  opportunity  for 
doing  business  which  these  conditions  offered,  led  to  all  sorts 
of  demands  for  labor-saving  and  time-saving  machinery. 
Another  very  marked  characteristic  of  the  period  1825-1840, 
therefore,  is  the  display  of  the  inventive  genius  of  the  people. 
Articles  which  a  few  years  before  were  made  by  hand  now 
began  to  be  made  by  machinery. 

Before  1825  every  farmer  in  the  country  threshed  his  grain 
with  a  flail,  or  by  driving  cattle  over  it,  or  by  means  of  a 
large  wooden  roller  covered  with  pegs.  After  1825  these 
rude  devices  began  to  be  supplanted  by  the  threshing  ma 
chine.  Till  1826  no  axes,  hatchets,  chisels,  planes,  or  other 
edge  tools  were  made  in  this  country.  In  1826  their  manu 
facture  was  begun,  and  in  the  following  year  there  was 
opened  the  first  hardware  store  for  the  sale  of  American- 
made  hardware. 

The  use  of  anthracite  coal  had  become  so  general  that  the 
wood  stove  was  beginning  to  be  displaced  by  the  hard-coal 
stove,  and  in  1827  fire  bricks  were  first  made  in  the  United 
States.  It  was  at  about  this  time  that  paper  was  first  made 
of  hay  and  straw ;  that  boards  were  first  planed  by  machine ; 
that  bricks  were  first  made  by  machinery;  that  penknives 
and  pocketknives  were  first,  manufactured  in  America;  that 
Fairbanks  invented  the  platform  weighing  scales ;  that  chloro 
form  was  discovered ;  that  Morse  invented  the  recording  tele 
graph  ;  that  a  man  in  New  York  city,  named  Hunt,  made  and 
sold  the  first  lock-stitch  sewing  machine  ever  seen  in  the 


290      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR  COUNTRY 

world;  that  pens  and  horseshoes  were  made  by  machine;  that 
the  reaping  machine  was  given  its  first  public  trial  (in  Ohio) ; 
and  that  Colt  invented  the  revolver. 

322.  Condition  of  the  Cities. — Yet  another  characteristic  of 
the  period  was  the  great  change  which  came  over  the  cities  and 
towns.  The  development  of  canal  and  railroad  transportation 
had  thrown  many  of  the  old  highways  into  disuse,  had  made 


New  York  in  1830  (St.  Paul's  Chapel,  on  Broadway) 

old  towns  and  villages  decline  in  population,  and  had  caused 
new  towns  to  spring  up  and  flourish.  Everybody  now  wanted 
to  live  near  a  railroad  or  a  canal.  The  rapid  increase  in  manu 
factures  had  led  to  the  occupation  of  the  fine  water-power  sites, 
and  to  the  creation  of  many  such  manufacturing  towns  as 
Lowell  (in  Massachusetts)  and  Cohoes  (in  New  York).  The 
rise  of  so  many  new  kinds  of  business,  of  so  many  corpora 
tions,  mills,  and  factories,  caused  a  rush  of  people  to  the  cities, 
which  now  began  to  grow  rapidly  in  size. 


HIGHWAYS  OF  TRADE   AND  COMMERCE  291 

This  made  a  change  in  city  government  necessary.  The 
constable  and  the  watchman  with  his  rattle  had  to  give  place 
to  the  modern  policeman.  The  old  dingy  oil  lamps,  lighted 
only  when  the  moon  did  not  shine,  gave  place  to  gas.  The 
cities  were  now  so  full  of  clerks,  workingmen,  mechanics,  and 
other  people  who  had  to  live  far  away  from  the  places  where 
they  were  employed,  that  a  cheap  means  of  transportation 
about  the  streets  became  necessary.  Accordingly,  in  1830,  an 
omnibus  line  was  started  in  New  York.1  It  succeeded  so 
well  that  in  1832  the  first  street  horse-car  line  in  America 
was  operated  in  New  York  city. 

323.  The  Owenite  Communities.  —  The  efforts  thus  made 
everywhere  and  in  every  way  to  increase  the  comforts  and 
conveniences  of  mankind  turned  the  years  1820-1840  into 
a  period  of  reform.  Anything  new  was  eagerly  taken  up. 
When,  therefore,  a  Welshman  named  liobert  Owen  came  over 
to  this  country,  and  introduced  what  he  considered  a  social 
reform,  numbers  of  people  in  the  West  became  his  followers. 
Owen  believed  that  most  of  the  hardships  of  life  came  from 
the  fact  that  some  men  secured  more  property  and  made  more 
money  than  others.  He  believed  that  people  should  live 
together  in  .communities  in  which  the  farms,  the  houses,  the 
cattle,  the  products  of  the  soil,  should  be  owned  not  by 
individual  men,  but  by  the  whole  community.  He  held 
that  there  should  be  absolute  social  equality,  and  that  no 
matter  what  sort  of  work  a  man  did,  whether  skilled  or  un 
skilled,  it  should  be  considered  just  as  valuable  as  the  work 
of  any  other  man. 

All  this  was  very  alluring,  and  in  a  little  while  Owenite 
communities  were  started  in  Indiana,  Ohio,  Tennessee,  Penn 
sylvania,  and  New  York,  only  to  end  in  failure.2 

1  Many  did  not  know  what  the  word  "Omnibus"  painted  along  the 
top  of  the  stages  meant.     Some  thought  it  was  the  name  of  the  man  who 
owned  them.     It  is,  of  course,  a  Latin  word,  and  means   "for  all"; 
that  is,  the  stages  were  public  conveyances  for  the  use  of  all. 

2  Noyes's  History  of  American  /Socialism. 

McM.   1 1  isr.  —  17 


292      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUR   COUNTRY 

324.  The  Mormons.  —  But  there  was  a  social  movement  started 
at  this  time  which  still  exists,  In  1827,  at  Palmyra,  in  New 
York,  a  young  man  named  Joseph  Smith  announced  that  he 
had  received  a  new  bible  from  an  angel  of  the  Lord.  It  was 
written,  he  said,  on  golden  plates,  which  he  claimed  to  have 
read  by  the  aid  of  two  wonderful  stones;  and  in  1830  he  gave 
to  the  world  The  Book  of  Mormon. 

After  the  book  appeared,  Smith  and  a  few  others  organized 
a  church.  Many  at  once  began  to  believe  in  the  new  religion. 
But  the  West  seemed  so  much  better  a  field  that  in  1831 
Smith  and  his  followers  started  for  Ohio,  and  at  Kirtland 
established  a  Mormon  community.  There  the  Mormons  lived 
for  several  years,  and  then  went  to  Missouri,  whence  they 
were  expelled,  partly  because  they  were  an  antislavery  people. 
In  1840  they  settled  011  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi  in 
Illinois  and  built  the  town  of  Nauvoo.  At  Nauvoo  they 
remained  till  1846,  when,  having  adopted  polygamy,  they 
were  driven  off  by  the  people  of  Illinois,  and,  led  by  Brigham 
Young,  marched  to  Council  Bluffs,  in  Iowa.  There  they 
stopped  to  look  about  them  for  a  safe  place  of  abode,  and 
finally,  in  1847,  left  Council  Bluffs  for  Great  Salt  Lake,  then 
in  the  dominions  of  Mexico.1 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  rise  of  the  new  states  in  the  West,  and  the  appearance  of  the 

steamboat  on  the  Mississippi,  were  the  causes  of  a  great  revival  of 
public  interest  in  internal  improvements. 

2.  The  first  to  build  a  great  western  highway  was  New  York  state,  which, 

between  1817  and  1825,  built  the  Erie  Canal. 

3.  This  cut  down  the  cost  of  moving  freight  to  the  West,  led  to  settle 

ment  along  the  banks  of  the  canal,  and  made  New  York  city  the 
metropolis  of  the  country. 

4.  It  was  during  this   period,    1815-1830,   that   many   inventions,   dis 

coveries,  and  improvements  were  made  in  the  arts  and  sciences. 

5.  The  railroad  was  introduced,  and  the  steam  locomotive  successfully 

used. 

6.  The  cities  grew,  and  in  New  York  the  omnibus  and  the  street  car  began 

to  be  used. 

1  Kennedy's  Early  Days  of  Mormonism. 


HIGHWAYS   OF   TRADE   AND   COMMERCE 


293 


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Brick-making  machine. 
Planing  machine. 
Platform  scales. 
Reaping  machine. 

p< 

expansion  of  the  country.  - 
and  the  increased  opportunit 

Steamboats  on  the  Hudsoi 
Erie  Canal. 
Steamboats  on  the  Lakes. 
Chautauqua  Lake  and  A 
gheny  valley. 
Effect  of  Erie  Canal. 

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Lead  to  great  rival: 

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1 

CHAPTER   XXIII 

POLITICS   FROM   1824   TO    1845 

325.  New  Political  Institutions.  — Of  the  political  leaders  of 
Washington's  time  few  were  left  in  1825.     The  men  who.  then 
conducted  affairs  had  almost  all  been  born  since  the  Revolu 
tion,  or  were  children  at  the  time.1     The  same  is  true  of  the 
mass  of  the  people.     They  too  had  been  born  since  the  Revo 
lution,  and,  growing  up  under  different  conditions,  held  ideas 
very  different  from  the  men  who  went  before  them.     They 
were  more  democratic  and  much  less   aristocratic,  more  hu 
mane,  more  practical.     They  abolished  the  old  and  cruel  pun 
ishments,  such  as  branding  the  cheeks  and  foreheads  of  crimi 
nals  with  letters,  cutting  off  their  ears,  putting  them  in  the 
pillory  and  the  stocks ;   they   partly  abolished  imprisonment 
for  debt ;  they  established  free  schools,  reformatories,  asylums, 
and  penitentiaries.     They  amended  their  state  constitutions 
or  made  new  ones,  and  extended  the  right  to  vote,  and  intro 
duced  new  political  institutions,  some  of  which  were  of  doubt 
ful  value,  but  are  still  used. 

326.  Political  Proscription  ;  the  Gerrymander.  —  One  of  these 
was  the  custom  of  turning  men  out  of  public  office  because 
they  did  not  belong  to  the  party  in  power,  or  did  not  "  work  " 
for  the  election  of  the  successful  candidate.     As  early  as  1792 
this  vicious  practice  was  in  use  in  Pennsylvania,  and  a  few 
years  later  was  introduced  in  New  York  by  De  Witt  Clinton. 
Jefferson  resorted  to  it  when  he  became  President,  but  it  was 

1  John  Quincy  Adams  and  Andrew  Jackson  were  born  in  1767 ;  Henry 
Clay,  in  1777  ;  John  C.  Calhoun,  Daniel  Webster,  Martin  Van  Buren, 
and  Thomas  II.  Benton,  in  1782. 

204 


POLITICS   FROM    1824   TO    1845 


295 


not  till  1820  that  it  was  firmly  established  by  Congress.  In. 
that  year  William  H.  Crawford,  who  was  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  and  a  presidential  candidate,  secured  the  passage  of 
a  "  tenure  of  office  "  act,  limiting  the  term  of  collectors  of  reve 
nue,  and  a  host  of  other  officials,  to  four  years,  and  thus  made 
the  appointments  to  these  places  rewards  for  political  service. 

Another  institution  dating  from  this  time  is  the  gerry 
mander.  In  1812,  when  Elbridge  Gerry  was  the  Republican 
governor  of  Massachusetts,  his  party,  finding  that  at  the  next 
election  they  would  lose  the  governorship  and  the  House  of 
Representatives,  decided  to  hold  the  Senate  by  marking  out 
new  senatorial  districts.  In  doing  this  they  drew  the  lines 
in  such  wise  that  districts  where  there  were  large  Federalist 
majorities  were  cut  in  two,  and  the  parts  annexed  to  other 
districts,  where  there  were  yet  larger  Republican  majorities. 

The  story  is  told  that  a  map  of  the  Essex  senatorial  district 
was  hanging  on  the  office  wall  of  the  editor  of  the  Columbian 

Centinel,    when    a    famous 
artist    named     Stuart    en 
tered.    Struck  by  the  pecul 
iar    outline    of    the    towns 
forming    the    district,     he 
added  a  head,  wings,  and  claws  with 
his  pencil,  and  turning  to  the  editor, 
said :   "  There,  that  will  do  for  a  sala 
mander."     "Better   say  a   Gerryman 
der,"  returned  the  editor,  alluding  to 
Elbridge  Gerry,  the  Republican  gov 
ernor  who  had  signed  the  districting 
act.    However  this  may  be,  it  is  certain 

that    the    name    "gerrymander"    was 

applied  to  the  odious  law  in  the  col 
umns  of  the  Centinel,  that  it  came  rapidly  into  use,  and  has 
remained  in  our  political  nomenclature  ever  since.  Indeed,  a 
huge  cut  of  the  monster  was  prepared,  and  the  next  year  was 
scattered  as  a  broadside  over  the  commonwealth,  and  so  aroused 


296      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUR   COUNTRY 

the  people  that  in  the  spring  of  1813,  despite  the  gerry 
mander,  the  Federalists  recovered  control  of  the  Senate,  arid 
repealed  the  law.  But  the  example  was  set,  and  was  quickly 
imitated  in  New  Jersey,  New  York,  and  Maryland.  This 
established  the  institution,  and  it  has  been  used  over  and  over 
again  to  this  day. 

327.  The  Third-term  Tradition.  —-  Another  political  custom 
which  had  grown  to  have  the  force  of  law  was  that  of  never 
electing  a  President  to  three  terms.     There  is  nothing  in  the 
Constitution  to  prevent  a  President  serving  any  number  of 
terms;  but,  as  we  have  seen,  when  Washington  finished  his 
second  he  declined  another,  and  when   Jefferson  (in  1807- 
1808)  was  asked  by  the  legislatures  of  several  states  to  accept 
a  third   term,  he   declined,   and  very  seriously  advised   the 
people  never  to  elect  any  man  President  more  than  twice.1 
The  example  so  set  was  followed  by  Madison  and  Monroe  and 
had  thus  by  1824  become  an  established  usage. 

328.  New  Political  Issues.  —  The  most  important  change  of 
all  was  the  rise  of  new  political  issues.     We  have  seen  how 
the  financial  questions  which  divided  the  people  in  1790-1792 
and  gave  rise  to  the  Federalist  and  Republican  parties,  were 
replaced  during  the  wars  between  England  and  France  by  the 
question,  "  Shall  the  United  States  be  neutral  ?  "     It  was  not 
until  the  end  of  our  second  war  with  Great  Britain  that  we 
were  again  free  to  attend  to  our  home  affairs. 

During  the  long  embargo  and  the  war,  manufactures  had 
arisen,  and  one  question  now  became,  "Shall  home  manufac 
tures  be  encouraged  ? "  With  the  rapid  settlement  of  the 
Mississippi  valley  and  the  demand  for  roads,  canals,  and 
river  improvements  by  which  trade  might  be  carried  on  with 
the  West,  there  arose  a  second  political  question :  "  Shall  these 
internal  improvements  be  made  at  government  expense  ?  " 

Now  the  people  of  the  different  sections  of  the  country  were 
not  of  one  mind  on  these  questions.  The  Middle  States  and 
Kentucky  and  some  parts  of  New  England  wanted  manufac- 
1  McMaster's  With  the  Fathers,  pp.  64-70. 


POLITICS   FROM   1824   TO    1845  297 

tures  encouraged.  In  the  West  and  the  Middle  States  people 
were  in  favor  of  internal  improvements  at  the  cost  of  the 
government.  In  the  South  Atlantic  States,  where  tobacco  and 
cotton  and  rice  were  raised  and  shipped  (especially  the  cotton) 
to  England,  people  cared  nothing  for  manufactures,  nothing 
for  internal  improvements. 

329.  Presidential   Candidates    in    1824. —  This    diversity    of 
opinion  on  questions  of  vital  importance  had  much  to  do  with 
the  breaking  up  of  the  Eepublican  party  into  sectional  fac 
tions  after  1820.     The  ambition  of  leaders  in  these  sections 
helped  on   the   disruption,   so    that   between  1821    and   1824 
four    men,    John  Quincy   Adams    of    Massachusetts,    Henry 
Clay  of  Kentucky,  Andrew  Jackson  of  Ten 
nessee,  John  C.  Calhoun  of  South  Carolina, 

were  nominated  for  President  by  state  legis 
latures  or  state  nominating  conventions,  by 
mass  meeting  or  by  gatherings  of  men  who 
had  assembled  for  other  purposes  but  seized 
the  occasion  to  indorse  or  propose  a  candi 
date.  A  fifth,  William  H.  Crawford,  was 
nominated  by  the  congressional  caucus, 
which  then  acted  for  the  last  time  in  our  ,ohn  QUincy  Adams 
history. 

Before  election  day  this  list  was  reduced  to  four :  Calhoun 
had  become  the  candidate  of  all  factions  for  the  vice  presi 
dency. 

330.  Adams  elected  by  the  House  of  Representatives.  —  The 
Constitution  provides  that  no  man  is  chosen  President  by  the 
electors  who  does  not  receive  a  majority  of  their  votes.     In 
1824    Jackson    received    ninety-nine ;    Adams,    eighty-four ; 
Crawford,    forty -one ;    and    Clay,    thirty-seven.      There  was, 
therefore,   no  election,  and  it  became  the  duty  of  the  House 
of  Representatives  to  make  a  choice.     But  according  to  the 
Constitution  only  the   three   highest  could  come   before   the 
House.     This  left  out  Clay,  who  was  Speaker  and  who  had 
great  influence.     His  friends  would  not  vote  for  Jackson  on 


Orlean 
E 

THE  UNITED  STATES 
July  4, 1826 

FIFTY  YEARS  AFTER  INDEPENDENCE 


300      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

any  account,  nor  for  Crawford,  the  caucus  candidate.  Adams 
they  liked,  because  he  believed  in  internal  improvements  at 
government  expense  and  a  protective  tariff.  Adams  accord 
ingly  was  elected  President.  Calhoun  had  been  elected  Vice 
President  by  the  electoral  college. 

The  election  of  John  Quincy  Adams  was  a  matter  of  intense 
disappointment  to  the  friends  of  Jackson.  In  the  heat  of 
party  passion  and  the  bitterness  of  their  disappointment  they 
declared  that  it  was  the  result  of  a  bargain  between  Adams 
and  Clay.  Clay,  they  said,  was  to  induce  his  friends  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  to  vote  for  Adams,  in  return  for 
which  Adams  was  to  make  Clay  Secretary  of  State.  No  such 
bargain  was  ever  made.  But  when  Adams  did  appoint  Clay 
Secretary  of  State,  Jackson  and  his  followers  were  fully  con 
vinced  of  the  contrary.1 

As  a  consequence,  the  legislature  of  Tennessee  at  once  re- 
nominated  Jackson  for  the  presidency,  and  he  became  the 
people's  candidate  and  drew  about  him  not  only  the  men  who 
voted  for  him  in  1824,  but  those  also  who  had  voted  for 
Crawford,  who  was  paralyzed  and  no  longer  a  candidate. 
They  called  themselves  "Jackson  men,"  or  Democratic  Re 
publicans. 

Adams,  it  was  known,  would  be  nominated  to  succeed  him 
self,  and  about  him  gathered  all  who  wanted  a  tariff  for  protec 
tion,  roads  and  canals  at  national  expense,  and  a  distribution 
among  the  states  of  the  money  obtained  from  the  sale  of 
public  lands.  These  were  the  "Adams  men,"  or  National 
Republicans. 

331.  Antimasons.  —  But  there  was  a  third  party  which  arose 
in  a  very  curious  way  and  soon  became  powerful.  In  1826, 
at  Batavia  in  New  York,  a  freemason  named  William  Mor 
gan  announced  his  intention  to  publish  a  book  revealing  the 
secrets  of  masonry ;  but  about  the  time  the  book  was  to  come 
out  Morgan  disappeared  and  was  never  seen  again.  This  led 

1  Parton's  Life  of  Jackson,  Chap.  10  ;  Sclmrz's  Life  of  Clay,  Vol.  I., 
pp.  203-258. 


POLITICS   FROM   1824  TO   1845  301 

to  the  belief  that  the  masons  had  killed  him,  and  stirred  up 
great  excitement  all  over  the  twelve  western  counties  of  New 
York.  The  "  antimasons  "  said  that  a  man  who  was  a  free 
mason  considered  his  duty  to  his  order  superior  to  his  duty  to 
his  country ;  and  a  determined  effort  was  made  to  prevent  the 
election  of  any  freemason  to  office. 

At  first  the  "  antimasonic  "  movement  was  confined  to  western 
New  York,  but  the  moment  it  took  a  political  turn  it  spread 
across  northern  Ohio,  Pennsylvania,  New  York,  Vermont, 
and  Massachusetts  and  Khode  Island,  and  was  led  by  some 
of  the  most  distinguished  men  and  aspiring  politicians  of  the 
time.1 

332.  The  Election  of  Jackson.  —  When  the  presidential  elec 
tion  occurred  in  1828,  there  were  thus   three   parties,  —  the 
"  Jackson  men,"  the  "  Administration,"  and  the  Antimasonic. 
But  politics  had  very  little  to  do  with  the  result.     In  the  early 
days  of  the  republic,  the  mass  of  men  were  ignorant  and  un 
educated,  and  willingly  submitted  to  be  led  by  men  of  educa 
tion  and  what  was  called  breeding.     From  Washington  down 
to  John  Quincy  Adams,  the  presidents  were  from  the  aristo 
cratic  class.     They  were  not  men  of  the  people.     But  in  course 
of  time  a  great  change  had  come  over  the  mass  of  Americans. 
Their  prosperity,  their  energy  in  developing  the  country,  had 
made  them  self-reliant,  and  impatient  of  all  claims  of  supe 
riority.     One  man  was  now  no  better  than  another,  and  the 
cry  arose  all  over  the  country  for  a  President  who  was  "a 
man  of  the  people."     Jackson  was  just  such  a  man,  and  it  was 
because  he  was  "a  man  of  the  people"  that  he  was  elected. 
Of  261  electoral  votes  he  received  178,  and  Adams  83. 

333.  The  North  and  the  South  Two  Different  Peoples.  — Be 
fore  entering  on  Jackson's  administration,  it  is  necessary  to 
call  attention  to  the  effect  produced  on  our  country  by  the  in 
dustrial  revolution  discussed  in  Chaps.  19  and  22.     In  the  first 
place,  it  produced  two  distinct  and  utterly  different  peoples : 
the  one  in  the  North  and  the  other  in  the  South.    In  the  North, 

1  Stan  wood's  Presidential  Elections,  Chap.  13. 


POLITICS  FROM    1824   TO    1845  303 

where  there  were  no  great  plantations,  no  great  farms,  and  where 
the  labor  was  free,  the  marvelous  inventions,  discoveries,  and 
improvements  mentioned  were  eagerly  seized  on  and  used. 
There  cities  grew  up,  manufactures  flourished,  canals  were 
dug,  railroads  were  built,  and  industries  of  every  sort  estab 
lished.  Some  towns,  as  Lynn,  Lowell,  Lawrence,  Fall  River, 
Cohoes,  Paterson,  Newark,  and  Pittsburg,  were  almost  en 
tirely  given  up  to  mills  and  factories.  No  such  towns  existed 
in  the  South.  In  the  South  men  lived  on  plantations,  raised 
cotton,  tobacco,  and  rice,  owned  slaves,  built  few  large  towns, 
cared  nothing  for  internal  improvements,  and  established  no 
industries  of  any  sort. 

This  difference  of  occupation  led  of  course  to  difference  of 
interests  and  opinions,  so  that  on  three  matters  —  the  exten 
sion  of  slavery,  internal  improvements,  and  tariff  for  protec 
tion —  the  North  and  the  South  were  opposed  to  each  other. 
In  the  West  and  the  Middle  States  these  questions  were  all- 
important,  and  by  a  union  of  the  two  sections  under  the 
leadership  of  Clay  a  new  tariff  was  passed  in  1824,  and  in 
the  course  of  the  next  four  years  $2,300,000  were  voted  for 
internal  improvements. 

The  Virginia  legislature  (1825)  protested  against  internal 
improvements  at  government  expense,  and  against  the  tariff. 
But  the  North  demanded  more,  and  in  1827  another  tariff  bill 
was  prevented  from  passing  only  by  the  casting  vote  of  Vice 
President  Calhoun.  And  now  the  two  sections  joined  issue. 
The  South,  in  memorials,  resolutions,  and  protests,  declared  a 
tariff  for  protection  to  be  unconstitutional,  partial,  and  oppress 
ive.  The  wool  growers  and  manufacturers  of  the  North  called 
a  national  convention  of  protectionists  to  meet  at  Harrisburg, 
and  when  Congress  met,  forced  through  the  tariff  of  1828. 
The  South  answered  with  anti-tariff  meetings,  addresses,  reso 
lutions,  with  boycotts  on  the  tariff  states,  and  with  protests 
from  the  legislatures.  Calhoun  then  came  forward  as  the 
leader  of  the  movement  and  put  forth  an  argument,  known  as 
the  South  Carolina  Exposition,  in  which  he  urged  that  a  con- 


304      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

vention  should  meet  in  South  Carolina  and  decide  in  what 
manner  the  tariff  acts  should  "be  declared  null  and  void 
within  the  limits  of  the  state." 

334.  May  a  State  nullify  an  Act  of  Congress  ?  —  The  right  of 
a  state  to  nullify  an  act  of  Congress  thus  became  the  question 
of  the  hour,  and  was  again  set  forth  yet  more  fully  by  Calhoun 
in  1831.     That  the  South  was  deeply  in  earnest  was  apparent, 
and  in  1832  Congress  changed  the  tariff  of  1828,  and  made  it 
less  objectionable.      But  it  was  against  tariff  for  protection, 
not   against  any   particular  tariff,  that   South   Carolina   con 
tended,  and   finding  that  the  North  would  not  give  up   its 
principles,  she  put  her  threat  into  execution.     The  legislature 
called  a  state  convention,  which  declared  that  the  tariffs  of 
1828  and  1832  were  null  and  void  and  without  force  in  South 
Carolina,  and   forbade   anybody  to    pay   the  duties   laid  by 
these  laws  after  February  1,  1833.1 

Jackson,  who  had  just  been  reflected,  was  not  terrified.  He 
bade  the  collector  at  Charleston  go  on  and  collect  the  revenue 
duties,  and  use  force  if  necessary,  and  he  issued  a  long  address 
to  the  Nullifiers.  On  the  one  hand,  he  urged  them  to  yield. 
On  the  other,  he  told  them  that  "  the  laws  of  the  United  States 
must  be  executed.  .  .  .  Those  who  told  you  that  you  might 
peacefully  prevent  their  execution  deceived  you.  .  .  .  Their 
object  is  disunion,  and  disunion  by  armed  force  is  treason." 

335.  Webster's  Great  Reply  to  Calhoun.  — Calhoun,  who  since 
1825  had  been  Vice  President  of  the  United  States,  now  re 
signed,  and  was  at  once  made  senator  from  South  Carolina. 
When  Congress  met  in  December,  1832,  the  great  question  be 
fore  it  was  what  to  do  with  South  Carolina.     Jackson  wanted 
a  "Force  Act,"  that  is,  an  act  giving  him  power  to  collect  the 
tariff  duties  by  force  of  arms.     Hayne,  who  was  now  governor 

1  Houston's  A  Critical  Study  of  Nullification  in  South  Carolina; 
Parton's  Jackson,  Vol.  III.,  Chaps.  32-34  ;  Schurz's  Life  of  Clay, 
Vol.  II.,  Chap.  14  ;  Von  Hoist's  Life  of  Calhoun,  Chap.  4  ;  Lodge's  Life 
of  Webster,  Chaps.  6,  7  j  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I., 
pp.  40-50. 


POLITICS   FROM   1824  TO   1845  305 

of  South  Carolina,  declared  that  if  this  was  done,  his  state  would 
leave  the  Union. 

A  great  debate  occurred  on  the  Force  Act,  in  which  Calhoun, 
speaking  for  the  South,  asserted  the  right  of  a  state  to  nullify 
and  secede  from  the  Union,  while  Webster,  speaking  for  the 
North,  denied  the  right  of  nullification  and  secession,  and  up 
held  the  Union  and  the  Constitution.1 

336.  The  Compromise  of  1833 Meantime,  Henry  Clay,  see 
ing  how  determined  each  side  was,  and  fearing  civil  war  might 
follow,  came  forward  with  a  compromise.     He  proposed  that 
the  tariff  of  1832  should  be  reduced  gradually  till  July,  1842, 
when  on  all  articles  imported  there  should  be  a  duty  equal  to 
twenty  per  cent   of  their  value.      This  was  passed,  and  the 
Compromise  Tariff,  as  it  is  called,  became  a  law  in  March, 
1833.     A  new  convention  in  South  Carolina  then  repealed  the 
ordinance  of  nullification. 

337.  War  on  the  Bank  of  the 'United  States.  —  While  South 
Carolina  was  thus  fighting   internal   improvements   and   the 
tariff,  the  whole  Jackson  party  was  fighting  the  Bank  of  the 
United  States.     You  will  remember  that  this  institution  was 
chartered  by  Congress  in  1816 ;   and  its  charter  was  to  run 
till   1836.      Among  the  rights  given  it  was  that   of  having 
branches  in  as  many  cities  in  the  country  as  it  pleased,  and, 
exercising  this  right,  it  speedily  established  branches  in  the 
chief  cities  of  the  South  and  West.      The  South  and  West 
were  already  full  of  state  banks,  and,  knowing  that  the  busi 
ness  of  these  would  be  injured  if  the  branches  of  the  United 
States  Bank  were  allowed  to  come  among  them,  the  people 
of   that   region   resented   the    reestablishment   of   a   national 
bank.     Jackson,  as  a  Western  man,  shared  in  this  hatred, 
and  when  he  became  President  was  easily  persuaded  by  his 
friends    (who   wished   to   force    the   Bank   to   take    sides    in 
politics)   to   attack   it.      The   charter   had  still  nearly  eight 

Johnston's  American  Orations,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  196-212;  Webster's 
Works,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  248-355,  448-505;  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United 
States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  50-52. 


306      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR    COUNTRY 

years  to  run;  nevertheless,  in  his  first  message  to  Congress 
(December,  1829)  he  denounced  the  Bank  as  unconstitutional, 
unnecessary,  and  as  having  failed  to  give  the  country  a  sound 
currency,  and  suggested  that  it  should  not  be  rechartered. 
Congress  paid  little  attention  to  him.  But  he  kept  on,  year 
after  year,  till,  in  1832,  the  friends  of  the  Bank  made  his 
attack  a  political'  issue.1 

338.  The  First  National  Nominating  Convention;  the  First 
Party  Platform.  —  To  do  this  was  easy,  because  in  1832  it  was 
well  known  that  Jackson  would  again  be  a  candidate  for  the 
presidency.  Now  the  presidential  contest  of  that  year  is 
remarkable  for  two  reasons : 

1.  Because  each  of  the  three  parties  held  a  national  conven 

tion  for  the  nomination  of  candidates. 

2.  Because  a  party  platform  was  then  used  for  the  first  time. 

The  originators  of  the  national  convention  were  the  Anti- 
masons.  State  conventions  of  delegates  to  nominate  state 
officers,  such  as  governors  and  congressmen  and  presidential 
electors,  had  long  been  in  use.  But  never,  till  September, 
1831,  had  there  been  a  convention  of  delegates  from  all  parts 
of  the  country  for  the  purpose  of  nominating  the  President 
and  Vice  President.  In-  that  year  Antimasonic  delegates  from 
twenty-two  states  met  at  Baltimore  and  nominated  William 
Wirt  and  Amos  Ell  maker. 

The  example  thus  set  was  quickly  followed,  for  in  Decem 
ber,  1831,  a  convention  of  National  Republicans  nominated 
Henry  Clay.  In  May,  1832,  a  national  convention  of  Demo 
crats  nominated  Martin  Van  Buren  for  Vice  President; 2  and  in 
that  same  month,  a  "national  assembly  of  young  men,"  or,  as 

1  Roosevelt's  Life   of  Benton,   Chap.  0  ;    Parton's  Life   of  Jackson, 
Vol.   III.,  Chaps.   29-31;    Tyler's  Memoir  of  Roger  B.   Taney,  Vol.  I., 
Chap.   3 ;     Von    Hoist's    Constitutional    History,    Vol.    II.,   pp.   31-52 ; 
Schurz's  Clay,  Vol.  I.,  Chap.  13 ;  American  History  Leaflets,  No.  24. 

2  It  was  not  necessary  to  nominate  Jackson.     That  lie  should  be  re- 
elected  was  the  wish  of   the   great   body   of  voters.     The   convention, 
therefore,  merely  nominated  a  Vice  President. 


POLITICS   FROM   1824  TO    1845  307 

the  Democrats  called  it,  "Clay's  Infant  School,"  met  at  Wash 
ington  and  framed  the  first  party  platform.  They  were  friends 
of  Clay,  and  in  their  platform  they  demanded  protection  to 
American  industries,  and  internal  improvements  at  govern 
ment  expense,  and  denounced  Jackson  for  his  many  removals 
from  office.  They  next  issued  an  address  to  the  people,  in 
which  they  declared  that  if  Jackson  were  reflected,  the  Bank 
would  "  be  abolished."  1 

339.  Jackson  destroys  the  Bank.  —  The  friends  of  the  Bank 
meantime  appealed  to  Congress  for  a  new  charter  and  found 
little    difficulty  in  getting    it.       But  when  the  bill   went  to 
Jackson  for  his  signature,   he  vetoed  it,   and,   as  its  friends 
had  not  enough  votes  to  pass  the  bill  over  the  veto,  the  Bank 
was  not  rechartered. 

The  only  hope  left  was  to  defeat  Jackson  at  the  polls.  But 
this  too  was  a  failure,  for  he  was  reflected  by  greater  majori 
ties  than  he  had  received  in  1828. 2 

340.  Jackson  withdraws    the    Government    Money  from  the 
Bank. — This   signal  triumph  was  understood  by  Jackson  to 
mean  that  the  people  approved  of  his  treatment  of  the  Bank. 
So  he  continued  to  hurt  it  all  he  could,  and  in  1833  ordered 
his  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to  remove  the  money  of  the 
United  States  from  the   Bank   and   its   branches.     This    the 
Secretary3  refused  to  do;    whereupon  Jackson   removed  him 
and   put   another,4  who  would,    in    his    place.      After    1833, 
therefore,  the  collectors  of  United  States  revenue  ceased  to 
deposit  it  in  the  Bank  of  the  United  States,  and  put  it  in  state 
banks  ("  pet  banks  ")  named  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
The  money  already  on  deposit  was  gradually  drawn  out,  till 
none  remained.5 

1  For  party  platform  see  M'Kee's  National  Platforms  of  all  Parties. 

2  Of  the  288  electoral  votes,  Jackson  received  219,  and  Clay  49.     Wirt, 
the  Antimason,  secured  7. 

3  William  J.  Duane.  4  Roger  B   Taney. 

•r>  Parton's  Jackson,  Vol.  III.,  Chaps.  36-39  ;  American  History  Leaflets, 
No.  24  ;  Sumner's  Jackson,  Chaps.  13,  14  ;  Von  Hoist's  Constitutional 
History,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  52-79;  Roosevelt's  Benton,  Chap.  0. 


808      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUtl   COUNTRY 

For  this  act  the  Senate,  when  it  met  in  December,  1833, 
passed  a  vote  of  censure  on  Jackson  and  entered  the  censure 
on  its  journal.  Jackson  protested,  and  asked  to  have  his  pro 
test  entered,  but  the  Senate  refused.  Whereupon  Benton  of 
Missouri  declared  that  he  would  not  rest  till  the  censure  was 
removed  or  "  expunged "  from  the  journal.  At  first  this  did 
not  seem  likely  to  occur.  But  Benton  kept  at  it,  and  at  last, 
in  1837,  the  Senate  having  become  Democratic,  he  succeeded.1 

341.  Wildcat  State  Banks.  —  As  soon  as  the  reelection  of 
Jackson  made  it  certain  that  the  charter  of  the  Bank  of  the 
United  States  would  not  be  renewed,  the  same  thing  happened 
in  1833  that  had  occurred  in  1811.     The  legislature  of  every 
state  was  beset  with  applications  for  bank  charters,  and  granted 
them.     In  1832  there  were  but  288  state  banks  in  the  country. 
In  1836  there  were  583.     Some  were  established  in  order  to 
get  deposits  of  the  government  money.     Others  were  started 
for  the  purpose  of  issuing  paper  money  with  which  the  bank 
officials  might  speculate.     Others,    of  course,   were  founded 
with  an  honest  purpose.     But  they  all  issued  paper  money, 
which  the  people  borrowed  on  very  poor  security  and  used 
in  speculation. 

342.  The  Period  of  Speculation.  —  Never  before  had  the  op 
portunity  for  speculation  been  so  great.     The  new  way  of  do 
ing  business,  the  rise  of  corporations  and  manufactures,  drew 
people  into  the  cities,  which  grew  in  area  and  afforded  a  chance 
for   investors  to  get  rich  by  purchasing  city  lots  and  hold 
ing  them  for  a  rise  in  price.    Railroads  and  canals  were  being 
projected   all    over   the   country.      Another   favorite  way  of 
speculating,  therefore,  was  to  buy  land  along  the  lines  of  rail 
roads  building  or  to  be  built.     Suddenly  cotton  rose  a  few 
cents  a  pound,  and  thousands  of  people  began  to  speculate 
in  slaves  and  cotton  land.     Others  bought  land  in  the  West 
from  the  government,  at  $1.25  an  acre,  and  laid  it  out  into 

1  When  the  resolution  had  passed,  the  Clerk  of  the  Senate  was  ordered 
to  bring  in  the  journal,  draw  a  thick  black  line  around  the  censure,  and 
write  across  it  "  Expunged  by  order  of  the  Senate,  January  16,  1837." 


POLITICS   FROM    1824   TO   1845  309 

town  lots,1  which  they  sold  for  $10  and  $20  apiece  to  people 
in  the  East.  In  short,  everybody  who  could  was  borrowing 
paper  money  from  the  banks  and  speculating. 

Under  these  conditions,  any  cause  which  should  force  the 
banks  to  stop  loaning  money,  or  to  call  in  that  already  loaned, 
would  bring  on  a  panic.  And  this  is  just  what  happened. 

343.  The  Specie  Circular.  —  Speculation  in  government  land 
was  so  general  that  the  annual  sales  rose  from  $2,300,000  in 
1831,  to    $24,900,000   in  1836. 2     Finding   that    these   great 
purchases  were  paid  for  not  in  gold  and  silver,  but  in  state 
bank  paper  money,  Jackson  became  alarmed.     Many  of  the 
banks   were  of  doubtful  soundness,   and    if   they   failed,   all 
their  money  which  the  government  had  taken  for  land  would 
be   lost.     In    1836,    therefore,    Jackson    issued    his    "  Specie 
Circular,"   which  commanded  all  officials  authorized  to  sell 
government    land  to  receive  payment    in   nothing   but   gold 
or  silver  or  land  scrip.     A  great  demand  for  specie    and  a 
removal  of  it  from  the  banks  in  the  East  to  those  in  the  West 
followed,  which  gf  course  hurt  the  Eastern  banks,  because  it 
took  away  some  of  their  money,   and   that   kind   of   money 
which  they  were  holding  for  the  purpose  of  redeeming  their 
paper. 

Another  thing  which  hurt  the  banks,  by  forcing  them  to  stop 
loaning  and  to  call  for  a  settlement  of  debts,  was  the  distribu 
tion  of  the  surplus  revenue  among  the  states. 

344.  The    Surplus    Revenue. — What   caused    this    surplus 
revenue?     Many  things. 

1.  The  United  States  had  no  debt.  The  national  debt,  you 
remember,  was  created  in  1790  by  funding  the  foreign 
and  Congress  debt  and  assuming  those  of  the  states,  and 
amounted  to  $75,000,000.  When  Jefferson  was  elected 
President  in  1801,  this  debt  had  risen  to  $80,000,000; 
but  during  his  administration  it  fell  to  $57,000,000. 

1  Sometimes  ten  such  lots  would  be  laid  out  on  an  acre. 

2  Shepard's  Van  Buren,  Chap.  8  ;  Sumner's  Jackson,  pp.  322-325. 


810      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  OUR   COUNTRY 

The  war  with  England  raised  it  to  $127,000,000,  after 
which  it  once  more  decreased  year  by  year  till  1835, 
when  every  dollar  was  paid  off,  and  the  United  States 
was  out  of  debt.1 

2.  The  expenses  of  the  government  were  not  large. 

3.  There   was  a  heavy  importation  of  foreign  goods,   which 

produced  a  great  revenue  under  the  tariff  act. 

4.  The    immense    speculation   in  government    lands   already 

described  produced  a  large  income  to  the  government.2 

In  consequence  of  these  causes,  the  government  on  June  1, 
1836,  had  in  the  banks  $41,500,000  more  than  it  needed. 

What  to  do  with  this  useless  money  sorely  puzzled  Con 
gress.  It  could  not  reduce  the  tariff,  because  that  was  grad 
ually  being  reduced  under  the  compromise  of  1833.  Some 
wanted  the  money  derived  from  the  sale  of  land  distributed. 
But  at  last  it  was  decided  to  take  all  the  surplus  the  govern 
ment  had  on  January  1,  1837,  subtract  $5,000,000  from  it,  and 
divide  the  rest  by  the  number  of  senators  and  representatives 
in  Congress,  and  give  each  state  as  many  parts  as  it  had  sena 
tors  and  representatives.3 

On  January  1,  1837,  the  surplus  was  $42,468,000,  which, 
after  subtracting  the  $5,000,000,  left  $37,4(58,000  to  be  distrib 
uted.  It  was  to  be  paid  in  four  installments;4  but  only  three 
of  them  were  ever  paid,  for,  when  October  1,  1837,  came,  the 
whole  country  was  suffering  from  a  panic,.5 

345.  The  Panic  of  1837. — Now,  when  the  banks  in  which 
the  government  surplus  was  kept  were  suddenly  called  on  to 
give  it  up  in  order  that  it  might  be  distributed  among  the 

1  As  bonds,  etc.,  to  the  value  of   $35,000  were  never  presented  for 
payment,  the  United  States  appears  to  have  always  been  in  debt.    This 
$35,000  probably  represents  evidences  of  indebtedness  lost  by  the  owners. 

2  The  land  sales  were  $4,800,000  in  1834,   $14,757,000  in   1835,  and 
$24,877,000  in  1830. 

3  One  state,  New  York,  was  to  receive  $4,000,000,  three  states  over 
$2,000,000,  six  over  $1,000,000,  and  eight  over  $500,000. 

4  The  days  of  payment  were  Jan.  1,  April  1,  July  1,  and  Oct.  1,  1837. 
6  Bourne's  History  of  the  Surplus  Revenue  of  1837. 


POLITICS  FROM   1824  TO   1845  311 

states,  (as  they  had  loaned  this  surplus)  they  were  all  forced 
to  call  it  in.  More  than  that,  they  would  make  no  new  loans. 
This  made  credit  hard  to  get.  As  a  consequence,  mills  and 
factories  shut  down,  all  buying  and  selling  stopped,  and  thou 
sands  of  workmen  wrere  thrown  out  of  employment.  As  every 
body  wanted  money,  it  followed  that  houses,  lands,  property 
of  every  sort,  was  offered  for  sale  at  ridiculously  low  prices. 
But  there  were  no  buyers.  In  New  York  the  distress  was  so 
great  that  bread  riots  occurred.  The  merchants,  unable  to  pay 
their  debts,  began  to  fail,  and  to  make  matters  worse  the  banks 
all  over  the  country  suspended  specie  payment ;  that  is,  refused 
to  give  gold  and  silver  in  exchange  for  their  paper  bills.  Then 
the  panic  set  in,  and  for  a  while  the  people,  the  states,  and  the 
government  were  bankrupt.1 

346.  Election   of    Martin   Van    Buren ;    Eighth   President.  — 
In  accordance  with  the  well-established  custom  that  no  Presi 
dent  shall  have  more  than  two  terms,  J  ackson 

would  not  accept  a  renomination  in.  1836. 
So  the  Democratic  national  convention  nomi 
nated  Martin  Van  Buren  and  R.  M.  Johnson. 
The  Whigs,  as  the  National  Republicans 
called  themselves  after  1834,  did  not  hold  a 
national  nominating  convention,  but  agreed 
to  support  William  Henry  Harrison.  Van 
Buren  was  elected,  and  inaugurated  March 

4    1837  2  Martin  Van  Buren 

347.  The  New  National  Debt;   the  Independent  Treasury.— 
But  scarcely  had  he  taken  the  oath  of  office  when  the  panic 
swept  over  the  country,  and  his  whole  term  was  one  of  financial 
distress  or  hard  times.     The   suspension  of  specie   payment 
and  the  failures  of  many  banks  and  merchants  left  the  govern 
ment  without  money,  and  forced  Van  Buren  to  call  an  extra 
session  of  Congress  in  September,  1837.     Before  adjourning, 
Congress  ordered  the  fourth  or  October  installment  of  the  dis 
tributed  revenue  to  be  suspended.      It  has  never  been  given  to 

1  Shepard's  Van  Buren,  Chap.  8.  2  JR,^.,  diap  7. 

McM.  HIST.  — 18 


812      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

the  states.  Congress  also  authorized  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  to  issue  $10,000,000  in  treasury  notes,  and  so  laid 
the  foundation  for  the  second  national  debt,  which  one  cause 
or  another  has  continued  ever  since. 

The  experience  the  government  had  thus  twice  passed 
through  (1814  and  1837)  led  the  people  to  believe  it  ought  not 
to  keep  its  money  in  state  banks.  But  just  where  the  money 
should  be  kept  was  a  disputed  party  question.  The  Whigs 
insisted  on  a  third  National  Bank  like  the  old  one  Jackson 
had  destroyed.  Van  Buren  wanted  what  was  called  an  "  Inde 
pendent  Treasury,"  and  after  four  attempts  the  act  establishing 
it  was  passed  in  1840. 

The  law  created  four  "  receivers  general "  (one  each  at  Boston, 
New  York,  Charleston,  and  St.  Louis),  to  whom  all  money 
collected  by  the  United  States  officials  should  be  turned  over, 
and  directed  that  "  rooms,  vaults,  and  safes "  should  be  pro 
vided  for  the  safe  keeping  of  the  money.1 

As  might  be  expected,  the  people  laid  all  the  blame  for  the 
hard  times  on  Van  Buren  and  his  party.  The  Democrats,  they 
said,  had  destroyed  the  National  Bank ;  they  had  then  removed 
the  United  States  money,  and  given  it  to  "  pet "  state  banks ; 
they  had  then  distributed  the  surplus,  and  by  taking  the  sur 
plus  from  the  state  banks  had  brought  on  the  panic.  Whether 
this  was  true  or  not,  the  people  believed  it,  and  were  determined 
to  "turn  out  little  Van." 

The  campaign  of  1840  was  the  most  novel,  exciting,  and 
memorable  that  had  yet  taken  place.  Three  parties  had  can 
didates  in  the  field.  The  Antislavery  party  put  forward  James 
Gillespie  Birney  and  Thomas  Earle.  The  Democrats  in  their 
convention  renominated  Van  Buren,  but  no  Vice  President. 
The  Whigs  nominated  W.  H.  Harrison,  and  John  Tyler  of 
Virginia.  The  mention  of  the  Antislavery  party  makes  it 
necessary  to  account  for  its  origin. 

348.    The  Antislavery  Movement.  —  The   appearance  of  the 
Antislavery  or  Liberty  party  marks  the  beginning  in  national 
1  Shepard's  Van  Buren,  Chap.  9. 


POLITICS   FROM   1824  TO    1845  313 

affairs  of  an  antislavery  movement  which  had  long  been  going 
on  in  the  states.  When  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  made 
in  1820,  many  people  believed  that  the  troublesome  matter  of 
slavery  wras  settled.  This  was  a  mistake,  and  the  compromise 
really  made  matters  worse.  In  the  first  place,  it  encouraged 
the  men  in  Illinois  who  favored  slavery  to  attempt  to  make  it  a 
slave  state  by  amending  the  state  constitution,  an  attempt  which 
failed  in  1824  after  a  long  struggle.  In  the  second  place,  it 
aroused  certain  men  who  had  been  agitating  for  freeing  the 
slaves  to  redoubled  energy.  Among  these  were  Benjamin 
Lundy,  James  Gillespie  Birney,  and  William  Lloyd  Garrison, 
who  in  1831  established  an  abolition  newspaper  called  the 
Liberator,  which  became  very  famous.  In  the  third  place,  it 
led  to  the  formation  all  over  the  North,  and  in  many  places 
in  the  South,  of  new  abolition  societies,  and  stirred  up  the 
old  ones  and  made  them  more  active.1 

For  a  time  these  societies  carried  on  their  work,  each  inde 
pendent  of  the  others.  But  in  1833,  a  convention  of  delegates 
from  them  met  at  Philadelphia,  and  formed  a  national  society 
called  the  American  Antislavery  Society.3 

349.  Antislavery  Documents  shut  out  of  the  Mails.  —  Thus 
organized,  the  society  went  to  work  at  once  and  flooded  the 
South  with  newspapers,  pamphlets,  pictures,  and  handbills, 
all  intended  to  arouse  a  sentiment  for  instant  abolition  or 
emancipation  of  slaves.  The  South  declared  that  these  were 
inflammatory,  insurrectionary,  and  likely  to  incite  the  slaves  to 
revolt,  and  called  on  the  North  to  suppress  abolition  societies 
and  stop  the  spread  of  abolition  papers.  To  do  such  a  thing 
by  legal  means  was  impossible;  so  an  attempt  was  made  to 
do  it  by  illegal  means.  In  the  Northern  cities  such  as  Phila 
delphia,  Utica,  Boston,  Haverhill,  mobs  broke  up  meetings  of 

1  James  G.  Birney  and  his  Times,  Chap.  12. 

2  Its  constitution  declared  (1)  that  each  state  has  exclusive  right  to 
regulate  slavery  within  it ;  (2)  that  the  society  will  endeavor  to  persuade 
Congress  to  stop  the  interstate  slave  trade,  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  terri 
tories  and  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  and  to  admit  no  more  slave  states 
into  the  Union. 


314      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT   OF   OUR   COUNTRY 

abolitionists,  and  dragged  the  leaders  about  the  streets.  In 
the  South,  the  postmasters,  as  at  Charleston,  seized  anti- 
slavery  tracts  and  pamphlets  going  through  the  mails,  and  the 
people  burned  them.  In  New  York  city  such  matter  was 
taken  from  the  mails  and  destroyed  by  the  postmaster.  When 
these  outrages  were  reported  to  Amos  Kendall,  the  Postmaster- 
General,  he  approved  of  them ;  and  when  Congress  met,  Jack 
son  asked  for  a  law  that  would  prohibit  the  circulation  "  in 
the  Southern  States,  through  the  mails,  of  incendiary  publica 
tions  intended  to  instigate  the  slaves  to  insurrection."  From 
the  legislatures  of  five  Southern  states  came  resolutions  call 
ing  on  the  people  of  the  North  to  suppress  the  abolitionists.1 
Congress  and  the  legislatures  of  New  York  and  Ehode  Island 
responded ;  but  the  bills  introduced  did  not  pass.2 

This  attempt  having  failed,  the  mobs  again  took  up  the 
work,  and  began  to  smash  and  destroy  the  presses  of  anti- 
slavery  newspapers.  One  paper,  twice  treated  in  this  manner 
in  1836,  was  the  Philanthropist,  published  at  Cincinnati  by 
James  Gillespie  Birney.  Another  was  the  Observer,  published 
at  Alton  by  Elijah  Lovejoy,  who  was  murdered  in  defending 
his  property.3  The  Pennsylvania  Freeman  was  a  third. 

350.  The  Gag  Rule.  — Not  content  with  attacking  the  liberty 
of  the  press,  the  proslavery  men  attacked  the  right  of  petition. 
The  Constitution  provides  that  "Congress  shall  make  no  law 
.  .  .  abridging  .  .  .  the  right  of  the  people  ...  to  petition  the 
government  for  a  redress  of  grievances."  Under  this  right 
the  antislavery  people  had  long  been  petitioning  Congress  to 
abolish  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  and  the  petitions 
had  been  received ;  but  of  course  not  granted.  Now,  in  1836, 
when  John  Quincy  Adams  presented  one  to  the  House  of  Kep- 
resentatives,  a  member  moved  that  it  be  not  received.  A  fierce 
debate  followed,  and  out  of  it  grew  a  rule  which  forbade  any 

1  South  Carolina,  North  Carolina,,  Alabama,  Virginia,  and  Georgia. 

2  James  G.  Birney  and  his  Times,  pp.  184-194. 

3  Wilson's  Else  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power  in  America,  Vol.  II., 
Chap.  27  ;  James  G.  Birney  and  his  Times,  pp.  204-219,  241-255. 


POLITICS  FROM   1824  TO   1845  315 

petition,  resolution,  or  paper  relating  in  any  way  to  slavery,  or 
the  abolition  of  slavery,  to  be  received.  This  famous  "  Gag 
Kale"  was  adopted  by  Congress  after  Congress  until  1844.1 

351.  The  Liberty  Party  formed.  —  The  effect  of  these  extreme 
measures   was  greatly  to  increase  the   antislavery  sentiment. 
But  the  men  who  held  these  sentiments  were  largely  members 
of  the  Whig  and  Democratic  parties.     In  the  hope  of  drawing 
them  from  their  parties,  and  inducing  them  to  act  together, 
the   antislavery  conventions    about   1838    began   to  urge   the 
formation  of   an  antislavery  party,  which  was  finally  accom 
plished   at   Albany,    N.Y.,   in    April,  1840,    where   James  G. 
Birney  was  nominated  for  President,  and  Thomas  Earle  for 
Vice  President.     No  name  was  given  to  the  new  organization 
till  1844,  when  it  was  christened  "Liberty  party." 

352.  The  Log  Cabin,  Hard  Cider  Campaign.  —  The  candidate 
of  the  Democrats  (Martin  Van  Buren)  was  a  shrewd  and  skill 
ful  politician.     The  candidate  of  the  Whigs  (Harrison)  was 
the  ideal  of  a  popular  favorite.     To  defeat  him  at  such  a  time, 
when  the  people  were  angry  with  the  Democrats,  would  have 
been  hard,  but   they  made   it  harder  still   by  ridiculing  his 
honorable  poverty  and  his  Western  surroundings.     At  the  very 
outset  of  the  campaign  a  Democratic  newspaper  declared  that 
Harrison  would  be  more  at  home  "in  a  log  cabin,  drinking 
hard  cider  and  skinning  coons,  than  living  in  the  White  House 
as  President."     The  Whigs  instantly  took  up  the  sneer  and 
made  the  log  cabin  the  emblem  of  their  party.     All  over  the 
country  log   cabins    (erected   at   some   crossroads,  or   on   the 
village  common,  or  on  some  vacant  city  lot)  became  the  Whig 
headquarters.     On  the  door  was  a  coon  skin ;  a  leather  latch 
string  was  always  hanging  out  as  a  sign  of  hospitality,  and 
beside  the   door  stood  a  barrel  of   hard   cider.     Every  Whig 
wore  a  Harrison  and  Tyler  badge,  and  knew  by  heart  all  the 
songs   in  the    Log   Cabin  Songster.     Immense  mass  meetings 
were  held,  at  which  50,000,  and  even  80,000,  people  attended. 
Weeks  were  spent  in  getting  ready  for  them.     In  the  West, 

1  Morse's  Life,  of  John  Quincy  Adams,  pp.  249-253,  306-308. 


316      INDUSTRIAL   DEVELOPMENT  OF   OUR   COUNTRY 


William  H.  Harrison 


/     thir 


where  railroads  were  few,  the  people  came  in  covered  wagons 
with  provisions,  and  camped  on  the  ground  days  before  the 
meeting.  At  the  monster  meeting  at  Day 
ton,  0.,  100,000  people  were  present,  covering 
ten  acres  of  ground.1 

353.  William  Henry  Harrison,  Ninth  Presi 
dent  ;  John  Tyler,  Tenth  President.  —  Harrison 
was  triumphantly  elected,  and  inaugurated 
March  4,  1841.  But  his  career  was  short, 
for  on  April  4  he  died,2  and  John  Tyler  took 
his  place.  Tyler  had  never  been  a  Whig. 
He  had  always  been  a  Democrat.  Never 
theless,  the  Whigs,  confident  of  his  aid,  tried 
to  carry  out  certain  reform  measures. 

54.  The  Quarrel  between  Tyler  and  the  Whigs.  —  The  first 
thing  they  did  was  to  repeal  the  law  establishing  the  Inde 
pendent  Treasury.  This  Tyler  approved.  They  next  attempted 
to  reestablish  the  Bank  of  the  United  States 
under  the  name  of  the  "  Fiscal  Bank  of  the 
United  States."  Tyler,  who  was  opposed  to 
banks,  vetoed  the  bill,  and  when  the  Whigs 
sent  him  another  to  create  a  "Fiscal  Corpo 
ration,"  he  vetoed  that  also.  Then  every 
member  of  the  cabinet  save  Webster  resigned, 
and  at  a  meeting  of  the  great  Whig  leaders 
Tyler  was  formally  "read  out  of  the  party." 
355.  The  Webster- Ashburton  Treaty.  —  Web 
ster  was  Secretary  of  State,  and  though  a  Whig,  retained  his 
place  in  order  that  he  might  complete  a  treaty  which  deter 
mined  our  boundary  line  from  the  source  of  the  St.  Croix  to 
the  St.  Lawrence,  thus  settling  a  long  dispute  between  Maine 
and  the  British  provinces  of  New  Brunswick  and  Canada.  The 

1  Shepard's  Van  Burcn,  pp.  323-335. 

2  His  death  was  a  great  shock  to  the  people.     Two  vice  presidents, 
George  Clinton  and  Elbridge  Gerry,  had  died  in  office.    But  nobody  seems 
to  have  thought  it  likely  that  a  president  would  die. 


John  Tyler 


POLITICS  FROM   1824   TO   1845 


317 


difficulty  arose  over  the  mean 
ing  of  terms  in  the  treaty  of 
1783,  and  though  twice  sub 
mitted  to  a  joint  commission, 
and  once  to  arbitration,  seemed 
further  than  ever  from  a  peace 
ful  settlement  when  Webster 
and  Lord  Ashburton  arranged 
it  in  1842.  The  treaty  rati 
fied,  Webster  soon  resigned. 

The  people  meanwhile  had 
recovered  from  the  excitement 
of  the  campaign  of  1840,  and 
at  the  congressional  election 
of  1842  they  made  the  House  of  Representatives  Democratic? 
There  were  thus  a  Whig  Senate,  a  Democratic  House,  and  a 
President  who  Avas  neither  a  Whig  nor  a  Democrat.  As  a 
consequence  few  measures  of  any  importance  were  passed  till 
1845. 

SUMMARY 

1.  During  1789-1825  a  marked  change  had  taken  place  in  the  ideas  of 

government,  and  this  led  to  new  state  constitutions  ;  to  an  exten 
sion  of  the  right  to  vote ;  to  the  belief  that  no  President  should 
have  more  than  two  terms ;  to  the  belief  that  political  offices 
should  be  given  to  political  workers  ;  and  to  the  introduction  of 
the  "gerrymander." 

2.  The  disappearance  of  issues  which  divided  the  Federalists  and  Re 

publicans  ;  the  loss  of  old  leaders  ;  the  appearance  of  a  new  genera 
tion  with  new  political  issues,  destroyed  old  party  lines. 

3.  First  to  disappear  were  the  Federalists.     In  1820  there  was  but  one 

presidential  candidate  (Monroe),  and  but  one  political  party  (the 
Republican). 

4.  During  Monroe's  second  term  the  new  issues  began  to  break  up  the 

Republican  party,  and  in  the  election  of  1824  the  people  of  the  four 
great  sections  of  the  country  presented  candidates.  For  the  second 
time  a  President  (John  Quincy  Adams)  was  elected  by  the  House 
of  Representatives. 

5.  In  1828  the  Republicans  again  supported  Jackson,  and  his  opponents 

under  Adams  were  defeated.     In  1827  the  antimasonic  party  arose. 


318      INDUSTRIAL  DEVELOPMENT   OF  OUR   COUNTRY 

6.  The  issues  now  before  the  people  were  the  tariff,  the  recharter  of 

the  National  Bank,  and  the  use  of  the  surplus  revenue,  and  these 
became  the  leading  questions  of  Jackson's  eight  years  (1829- 
1837). 

7.  The  general  use  of  the  steamboat,  and  the  good  roads,  so  reduced 

the  cost  of  transportation  that  it  was  possible  to  introduce  a  new 
piece  of  political  machinery  —  the  national  convention  —  to  nomi 
nate  candidates  for  President  and  Vice  President. 

8.  In  Jackson's  second  term  the  antislavery  movement  began  in  earnest ; 

the  Whig  party  was  organized  and  named ;  the  national  debt  was 
paid  off,  and  the  surplus  distributed. 

9.  Jackson  was  followed  by  Van  Buren,  in  whose  administration  the 

great  panic  of  1837  occurred.  Because  of  this  and  hard  times  a 
second  national  debt  was  started.  A  new  financial  measure  was 
the  establishment  of  the  Independent  Treasury. 

10.  This  the  Whigs  under  Tyler  destroyed.  They  attempted  to  replace  it 
with  a  third  National  Bank,  but  were  prevented  from  doing  so  by 
Tyler's  vetoes. 


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POLITICS   FKOM   1824   TO   1845 


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THE  LONG  STRUGGLE    WITH  SLAVERY 


CHAPTER   XXIV 

EXPANSION   OF   THE   SLAVE   AREA 

356.  Texas  secures  Independence.  —  The  fact  that  Tyler  now 
belonged  to  no  party  enabled  him  to  commit  an  act  which, 
had  he  belonged  to  either,  he  would  not  have  ventured  to 
commit  at  that  time, —  to  make  a  treaty  of  annexation  with 
Texas. 

In  1821  Mexico,  which  for  years  past  had  been  fighting 
for  independence,  was  set  free  by  Spain,  and  soon  established 
herself  as  a  republic  under  the  name  of  the  United  States  of 
Mexico.  The  old  Spanish  provinces  were  the  states,  and  one 
of  these  provinces  was  Texas.  As  a  country  Texas  had  been 
very  attractive  to  Americans,  and  the  eastern  part  would  have 
been  settled  early  in  the  century  if  it  had  been  definitely 
known  who  owned  it.  Now  that  Mexico  owned  it,  a  citizen 
of  the  United  States,  Moses  Austin,  asked  for  a  large  grant  of 
land  and  for  leave  to  bring  in  settlers.  A  grant  was  made  on 
condition  that  he  should  bring  in  300  families  within  a  given 
time.  Moses  Austin  died;  but  his  son  Stephen  went  on  with 
the  scheme  and  succeeded  so  well  that  others  followed  his 
example  till  seventeen  such  grants  had  been  perfected. 

For  some  years  the  settlers  managed  their  own  affairs  in 
their  own  way.  But  about  1830  Mexico  began  to  rule  them 
harshly,  and  when  they  were  unable  to  stand  it  any  longer 
they  rebelled  against  her  in  1833,  and  in  1836  set  up  the 
republic  of  Texas.  At  first  the  Texans  were  defeated,  and 
on  two  memorable  occasions  bands  of  them  were  massacred  by 

320 


EXPANSION   OF   THE    SLAVE   AREA 


321 


TERRITORY  CLAIMED 
BY  TEXAS 

WHEN  ADMITTED  INTO  THE  UNION 
1845 


the  Mexican  soldiers  after  they  had  surrendered.  Money  and 
troops  and  aid  of  every  sort,  however,  were  sent  from  the 
United  States,  and  at  length  Santa  Anna,  the  President  of 
Mexico,  who  commanded  the  Mexicans,  was  defeated  and 
captured  and  his  army  destroyed  by  the  Texans  under  Sam 
uel  Houston  at  the  battle  of  San  Jacinto  (1836).  The  vic 
tory  was  hailed  with  delight  all  over  our  country,  and  the 


322      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

independence   of    Texas    was   acknowledged   by   the    United 
States  (1837),  England,  France,  and   Belgium. 

357.  Texas  applies  for  Admission  to  the  Union.  — As  soon  as 
independence  was  acknowledged,  the  people  of  Texas  became 
very  anxious  to  have  their  republic  become  a  state  in  our 
Union;  but  slavery  existed  in  Texas,  and  the  men  of  the  free 
states  opposed  her  admission. 

At  last  in  1844  Tyler  secretly  negotiated  a  treaty  of  annexa 
tion  with  the  Texan  authorities,  and  surprised  the  Senate  by 
submitting  it  in  April.1 

The  politicians  were  very  indignant,  for  the  national  nomi 
nating  conventions  were  to  meet  in  May,  and  the  President  by 
his  act  had  made  the  annexation  of  Texas  a  political  issue. 
The  Democrats,  however,  took  it  up  and  in  their  platform 
declared  for  "the  reannexation  of  Texas,"  and  nominated 
James  K.  Polk  of  Tennessee  for  President  and  George  Mifflin 
Dallas  of  Pennsylvania  for  Vice  President. 

358.  The  Joint  Occupation  of  Oregon  is  continued.  —  But  there 
was  another  plank  in  the  Democratic  platform  of  1844  which 
promised  the  acquisition  of  a  great  piece  of  free  soil.     We  left 
the  question  of  the  ownership  of  Oregon  at  the  time  when  the 
United  States  and  Great  Britain  (in  1818)  agreed  to  hold  the 
country  in  joint  occupation  for  ten  years ;  and  when  Eussia, 
the  United  States,  and  Great  Britain  had  (in  1824  and  1825) 
made  54°  40'  the  boundary  line  between  the  Oregon  country 
and  Alaska.     Before  the  ten-year  period  of  joint  occupation 
expired,  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States,  in  1827,  agreed 
to  continue  it  indefinitely.     Either  party  could  end  the  agree 
ment  after  a  year's  notice  to  the  other. 

359.  Attempts  to  end  Joint  Occupation.  —  Before  this  time  the 
men  who  came  to  the  Oregon  country  were  explorers,  trappers, 
hunters,  servants  of  the  great  fur  companies,  who  built  forts 
and  trading  stations,  but  did  little  for  the  settlement  of  the 
region.     After  this  time  missionaries  were  sent  to  the  Indians, 
and  serious  efforts  were  made  to  persuade  men  to  emigrate  to 

1  The  Senate  rejected  the  treaty. 


EXPANSION   OF   THE    SLAVE   AREA  323 

Oregon.  Some  parties  did  go,  and  as  a  result  of  their  work, 
and  of  the  labors  of  the  missionaries,  Oregon,  in  the  course  of 
ten  years,  became  better  known  to  the  people  of  the  United 
States. 

Efforts  were  then  begun  to  persuade  Congress  to  extend 
the  jurisdiction  of  the  United  States  over  Oregon,  order  the 
occupation  of  the  country,  and  end  the  old  agreement  with 
Great  Britain.  Petitions  were  sent  (1838-1840),  reports  were 
made,  bills  were  introduced;  but  Congress  stood  firmly  by  the 
agreement,  and  would  not  take  any  steps  toward  the  occupa 
tion  of  Oregon.  In  1842,  Elijah  White,  a  former  missionary, 
came  to  Washington  and  so  impressed  the  authorities  with  the 
importance  of  settling  Oregon  that  he  was  appointed  Indian 
Agent  for  that  country,  and  told  to  take  back  with  him  as 
many  settlers  as  he  could.  Returning  to  Missouri,  he  soon 
gathered  a  band  of  112  persons  and  with  these,  the  largest 
number  of  settlers  that  had  yet  started  for  Oregon,  he  set  off 
across  the  plains  in  the  spring  of  1842.  At  the  next  session 
of  Congress  (1842-1843)  another  effort  was  made  to  provide  for 
the  occupation  of  Oregon  at  least  as  far  north  as  49°,  and  a  bill 
for  that  purpose  passed  the  Senate. 

Meanwhile  a  rage  for  emigration  to  Oregon  broke  out  in  the 
West,  and  in  the  early  summer  of  1843,  nearly  a  thousand 
persons,  with  a  long  train  of  wagons,  moved  out  of  Westport, 
Missouri,  and  started  northwestward  over  the  plains.  Like 
the  emigrants  of  1842,  they  succeeded  in  reaching  Oregon, 
though  they  encountered  many  hardships. 

360.  "  Fifty-Four  Forty  or  Fight."  —  So  much  attention  was 
thus  attracted  to  Oregon,  in  1843,  that  the  people  by  1844 
began  to  demand  a  settlement  of  the  boundary  and  an  end  of 
joint  occupation.  The  Democrats  therefore  gladly  took  up  the 
Oregon  matter.  Their  plan  to  reannex  Texas',  which  was  slave 
soil,  could,  they  thought,  be  offset  by  a  declaration  in  favor  of 
acquiring  all  Oregon,  which  was  free  soil.  The  Democratic 
platform  for  1844,  therefore,  declared  that "  our  title  to  the  whole 
of  Oregon  is  clear;  that  no  portion  of  the  same  ought  to  be  ceded 


324  THE   LONG   STRUGGLE    WITH   SLAVERY 

to  England  or  any  other  power;  and  that  the  reoccupation 
of  Oregon  and  the  reannexation  of  Texas"  were  great  American 
measures,  which  the  people  were  urged  to  support.  The  people 
thought  they  were  great  American  measures,  and  with  the 
popular  cries  of  "  The  reannexation  of  Texas,"  "  Texas  or 
disunion/7  "The  whole  of  Oregon  or  none," 
"Fifty -four  forty  or  fight,"  the  Democrats 
entered  the  campaign  and  won  it,  electing 
James  K.  Polk  and  George  M.  Dallas. 

The  Whigs  were  afraid  to  declare  for  or 
against  the  annexation,  so  they  said  nothing 
about  it  in  their  platform,  and  nominated 
Henry  Clay  of  Kentucky  and  Theodore 
Frelinghuyseii  of  New  Jersey.  The  real 
s  K.  Polk  question  of  the  campaign  was  of  course  the 
annexation  of  Texas,  and  though  the  platform  was  silent  on 
that  subject  their  leader  spoke  out.  In  a  public  letter  which 
appeared  in  a  newspaper  and  was  copied  all  over  the  Union, 
Clay  said  that  he  believed  slavery  was  doomed  to  end  at  no 
far  away  day  ;  that  the  admission  of  Texas  could  neither  hasten 
nor  put  off  the  arrival  of  that  day,  and  that  he  "  should  be  glad 
to  see  "  Texas  annexed  if  it  could  be  done  "  without  dishonor, 
without  war,  and  with  the  common  consent  of  the  Union  and 
upon  just  and  fair  terms." 

Language  of  this  sort  did  not  please  the  antislavery  Whigs ; 
and  in  New  York  numbers  of  them  voted  for  James  Or.  Birney 
and  Thomas  Morris,  candidates  of  the  Liberty  party.  The 
result  was  that  the  vote  for  Birney  in' New  York  in  1844  was 
more  than  twice  as  great  as  he  received  in  the  whole  Union  in 
1840.  Had  half  of  these  New  Yorkers  voted  for  Clay  instead, 
he  would  have  received  the  electoral  vote  of  New  York  and 
would  have  been  President. 

361.  Texas  annexed  to  the  United  States.  —  Tyler,  who  saw- 
in  the  result  of  the  election  a  command  from  the  people  to 
acquire  Texas,  urged  Congress  in  December,  1844,  to  annex  it  at 
once.  But  in  what  manner  should  it  be  acquired?  Some  said 


EXPANSION   OF  THE   SLAVE   AREA 


325 


THE  OREGON 
COUNTRY 


by  a  treaty.  This  would  require  the  consent  of  two  thirds  of 
the  Senate.  But  the  Democrats  did  not  have  the  votes  of  two 
thirds  of  the  Senate  and  so  could  not  have  secured  the  ratifica 
tion  of  such  a  treaty.  It  was  decided,  therefore,  to  annex  by 
joint  resolution,  which  required  but  a  majority  for  its  passage. 
The  House  of  Representatives  accordingly  passed  such  a  resolu 
tion  for  the  admission  of  Texas,  and  with  her  consent  for  the 


326      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

formation  of  four  additional  states  out  of  the  territory,  those 
north  of  36°  30'  to  be  free.  The  Senate  amended  this  resolu 
tion  and  gave  the  President  power  to  negotiate  another  treaty 
of  annexation,  or  submit  the  joint  resolution  to  Texas.  The 
House  accepted  the  amendment.  Tyler  chose  to  offer  the 
terms  in  the  joint  resolution.  Texas  accepted  them,  and  in 
December,  1845,  her  senators  and  representatives  took  their 
seats  in  Congress. 

362.  Oregon.  —  By  the  admission  of  Texas,  the  Democrats 
made  good  one  of  the  pledges  in  their  platform  of  1844.     They 
were  now  called  on  to  make  good  the  other,  which  promised 
the  whole  of  Oregon  up  to  54°  40'.     To  suppose  that  England 
would  yield  to  this  claim,  and  so  cut  herself  off  entirely  from 
the  Pacific  coast,  was  absurd.     Nevertheless,  because  of  the 
force  of  popular  opinion,  the  one  year's   notice  necessary  to 
terminate  joint  occupation  was  served  on  Great  Britain   in 
1846.     The  English  minister  thereupon  presented  a  treaty  ex 
tending  the  49th  parallel  across  Oregon  from  the  Rocky  Moun 
tains  to  the  coast,  and  drawing  a  line  down  the  strait  of  Juan 
de  Fuca  to  the  Pacific.     Polk  and  the  Senate  accepted  this 
boundary,  and  the  treaty  was  proclaimed  on  August  5,  1846. 
Two  years  later,  August  14, 1848,  Oregon  was  made  a  territory. 

363.  General  Taylor  enters  Texas  ;  War  with  Mexico  begins.  — 
When  Texas  came  into  the  Union,  she  claimed  as  her  western 
boundary  the  Rio  Grande  from  its  mouth  to  its  source  and 

a  l^e  due  north  to  42°.  Now  this  line  was  disputed  by 
Mexico,  which  clamied  that  the rkueces  River  was  the  western 
boundary  of  Texas.  The  disputed  strip  of  territory  was  thus 
between  the  Nueces  and  the  Rio  Grande  (p.  321). 

President  Polk,  however,  took  the  side  of  Texas,  claimed  the 
country  as  far  as  the  Rio  Grande,  and  in  January,  1846,  ordered 
General  Zachary  Taylor  to  march  our  army  across  the  Nueces, 
go  to  the  Rio  Grande,  and  occupy  the  disputed  strip.  This  he 
did,  and  on  April  25,  1846,  the  Mexicans  crossed  the  river  and 
attacked  the  Americans.  Taylor  instantly  sent  the  news  to 
Washington,  and,  May  12,  Polk  asked  for  a  declaration  of  war. 


EXPANSION   OF  THE   SLAVE   AREA 


327 


"Mexico/'  said  he,  "has  passed  the  boundary  of  the  United 
States ;  has  invaded  our  territory  and  shed  American  blood  on 
American  soil."  Congress  declared  that  war  existed,  and  Folk 
called  for  50,000  volunteers  (May  13,  1846). 

When  the  Mexicans  crossed  the  Rio  Grande  and  attacked 
the  Americans  at  Fort  Brown,  Taylor  was  at  Point  Isabel. 
Hurrying  southward  to  the  relief  of  the  fort,  he  met  the  enemy 
at  Palo  Alto,  beat  them,  pushed  on  to  Resaca  do  la  Palma,  beat 
them  again,  and  soon  crossed  the  river  and  took  possession  of 
the  town  of  Matamoras.  .There  he  remained  till  August,  1846, 
waiting  for  supplies,  reinforcements,  and  means  of  transporta 
tion,  when  he  began  a  march  toward  the  city  of  Monterey.  The 
Mexicans,  profiting  by  Taylor's  long  stay  at  Matamoras,  had 
gathered  in  great  force  at  Monterey,  and  had  strongly  fortified 


every  position.  But  Taylor  attacked  with  vigor,  and  after 
three  days  of  continuous  fighting,  part  of  the  time  from  street 
to  street  and  house  to  house,  the  Mexican  General  Ampudia 
surrendered  the  city  (September  24,  1846).  An  armistice  of 
six  weeks'  duration  was  then  agreed  on,  after  which  Taylor 
moved  on  leisurely  to  Saltillo  (sahl-teel'-yo). 

364.  Scott  in  Mexico.  —  Meantime,  General  Winfield  Scott 
was  sent  to  Mexico  to  assume  chief  command.  He  reached 
the  mouth  of  the  Rio  Grande  in  January,  1847,  and  called  on 
Taylor  to  send  him  10,000  men.  Santa  Anna  (sahn'-tah  aim - 
nah),  who  commanded  the  Mexicans,  hearing  of  this  order, 
marched  at  once  against  Taylor,  who  took  up  a  strong  position 


328 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


at  Buena  Vista  (bwa'-nali  vees'-tah),  where  a  desperate  battle 
was  fought  February  23,  1847.  The  Americans  won,  and 
Santa  Anna  hurried  off  to  attack  Scott,  who  was  expected 
at  Vera  Cruz.  Scott  landed  there  in  March,  and,  after  a 
siege  of  a  few  days,  took  the  castle  and  city,  and  ten  days 
later  began  his  march  westward  along  the  national  high 
way  towards  the  ancient  capital  of  the  Aztecs.  It  was  just 
328  years  since  Cortez  with  his  little  band  started  from  the 
same  point  on  a  precisely  similar  errand.  At  every  step  of  the 
way  the  ranks  of  Scott  grew  thinner  and  thinner.  Hundreds 
perished  in  battle.  Hundreds  died  by  the  wayside  of  disease 


CAMPAIGN  OF  GEN.SCOTT 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


ss^:\^/:~ss^&: 

.     Vi'1''"''-^"'-7*'^  >  >       ,   .Y'v:      •.:.-:'VV-'-.^  VeraCriizl  _' 

•v  J^^w      ^"llIr'V '"v(-!'.'..'..*\       ,.— 'vV  vPH.*>t,"|;     -C''      ^^y^^^^T^^^Pt  Anton 


more  terrible  than  battle.  But  Scott  would  not  turn  back, 
and  victory  succeeded  victory  with  marvelous  rapidity. 
April  8  he  left  Vera  Cruz.  April  18  he  stormed  the  heights 
of  Cerro  Gordo.  April  19  he  was  at  Jalapa  (hah-lah'-pah). 
On  the  22d  Perote  (pa-ro'-ta)  fell.  May  15  the  city  of  Puebla 
(pweb'4ah)  was  his.  There  Scott  staid  till  August  7,  when  he 
again  pushed  westward*  and  on4^e  10th  saw  the  city  of  Mexico. 
Then  followed  in  rapid  succession  the  victories  of  Contreras 
(con-tra'-rahs),  Churubusco  (choo-roo-boos'-ko),  Molino  del  Eey 
(mo-lee '-no  del  ra),  the  storming  of  Chapultepec  (chah-pool-ta- 
pek'),  and  the  triumphal  entry  into  Mexico,  September  14, 
1847.  Never  before  in  the  history  of  the  world  had  there 
been  made  such  a  march. 


EXPANSION  OF  THE  SLAVE  AREA  329 

365.  The  "Wilmot  Proviso."  —  In  1846  the  Mexican  War 

was  very  hateful  to  many  Northern  people,  and  as  a  new  House 
of  Representatives  was  to  be  elected  in  the  autumn  of  that  year, 
Polk  thought  it  wise  to  end  the  war  if  possible,  and  in  August 
asked  for  $2,000,000  "  for  the  settlement  of  the  boundary  ques 
tion  with  Mexico."  This,  of  course,  meant  the  purchase  of  terri 
tory  from  her.  But  Mexico  had  abolished  slavery  in  1827, 
and  lest  any  territory  bought  from  her  should  be  made  slave 
soil,  David  Wilmot  of  Pennsylvania  moved  that  the  money 
should  be  granted,  provided  all  territory  bought  with  it  should 
be  free  soil.  The  proviso  passed  the  House,  but  not  the  Senate. 
Next  year  (1847)  a  bill  to  give  Polk  $3,000,000  with  which  to 
settle  the  boundary  dispute  was  introduced,  and  again  the  pro 
viso  was  attached.  But  the  Senate  rejected  it,  and  the  House 
then  gave  way,  and  passed  the  bill  without  the  proviso. 

366.  Conquest  of  New  Mexico  and  California.  —  While  Taylor 
was  winning  victories  in  northeastern  Mexico,  Colonel  Stephen 
W.  Kearny  was  ordered  to  march  into  New  Mexico.     Leav 
ing  Fort  Leavenworth  in  June,  1846,  he  went  by  the  Upper 
Arkansas   River   to   Bents   Fort,   thence    southwest    through 
what  is  now  Colorado,  and  by  the  old  Santa  Fe  trail  to  the 
Rio  Grande  valley  and  Santa  Fe  (p.  330).     After  taking  the 
city  without  opposition,  he  declared  the  whole  of  New  Mexico 
to  be  the  property  of  the  United  States,  and  then  started  to 
seize   California.     On  arriving  there,  he  found  the  conquest 
completed  by  the  combined  forces  of  Stockton  and  Fremont. 

367.  The  Great  American  Desert.  —  But  how  came  Fremont 
to  be  in  California  in  1846  ? 

If  you  look  at  any  school  geography  published  between  1820 
and  1850  you  will  find  that  a  large  part  of  what  is  now  Ne 
braska,  Kansas,  Colorado,  Wyoming,  Oklahoma,  and  Texas  is 
put  down  as  "  THE  GREAT  AMERICAN  DESERT."  Many  believed 
it  was  not  unlike  the  Desert  of  Sahara,  and  that  nobody  would 
ever  want  to  cross  it,  while  there  was  so  much  fertile  land  to 
the  eastward.  This  view  made  people  very  indifferent  as  to 
our  claims  to  Oregon,  so  that  when  Thomas  H.  Benton,  one  of 


330 


EXPANSION   OF  THE   SLAVE   AREA  331 

the  senators  from  Missouri,  and  one  of  the  far-sighted  states 
men  of  the  day,  wanted  Congress  to  seize  and  hold  Oregon  by 
force  of  arms,  he  was  told  that  it  was  not  worth  the  cost. 
"Oregon/'  said  one  senator,  "will  never  be  a  state  in  the 
Union."  "Build  a  railroad  to  Oregon?"  said  another.  "Why, 
all  the  wealth  of  the  Indies  would  not  be  sufficient  for  such  a 
work." 

368.  The  Santa  Fe  and  Oregon  Trails.  —  Some  explorations  you 
remember  had  been  made.     Lewis  and  Clark  went  across  the 
Northwest  to  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia  in  1804-1805,  and 
Zebulon  M.  Pike  had  penetrated  in  1806  to  the  wild  moun 
tainous  region  about  the  head  waters  of  the  Platte,  Arkansas, 
and  Rio  Grande  and  had  probably  seen  the  great  mountain 
that  now  bears  his  name.     Major  Long  followed  Pike  in  1820, 
gave  his  name  to  Longs  Peak,  and  brought  back  such  a  dismal 
account  of  the  West  that  he  was  largely  responsible  for  the 
belief  in  a  desert.     The  great  plains  from  the  sources  of  the 
Sabine,  Brazos,  and  Colorado  rivers  to  the  northern  boundary 
were,  he  said,  "peculiarly  adapted  as  a  range  for  buffaloes,  wild 
goats,  and  other  wild  game,"  and  "might  serve  as  a  barrier 
to  prevent  too  great  an  expansion  of   our  population    west 
ward  " ;    but  nobody  would  think  of   cultivating  the  plains. 
For  years  after  that  the  American  Fur  Trading  Company  of 
St.  Louis  had  annually  sent  forth  its  caravans  into  Oregon  and 
New  Mexico.     Because  the  way  was  beset  by  hostile  Indians, 
these  caravans  were  protected  by  large  and  strongly  armed 
bands,  and  in  time  wore  out  well-beaten  tracks  across  the  prai 
ries  and  over  the  mountain  passes,  which  came  to  be  known 
on  the  frontier  as  the  Santa  Fe  and  Oregon  trails.     In  1832 
Captain  Bonneville l  took  a  wagon  train  over  the  Eocky  Moun 
tain  divide  into  the  Green   River  valley,  and  Nathaniel  J. 
Wyeth  led  a  party  from  New  England  to  the  Oregon  country, 
and  in  1834  established  Fort  Hall  in  what  is  now  Idaho.     Still 
later  in  the  thirties  went  Marcus  Whitman  and  his  party. 

369.  Explorations  of  Fremont.  —  By  this  time  it  was  clear 

1  Read  his  adventures  as  told  by  Washington  Irving. 
McM.  HIST.  — 19 


332      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

that  the  tide  of  westward  emigration  would  soon  set  in  strongly 
towards  Oregon.  Then  at  last  Benton  succeeded  in  persuad 
ing  Congress  to  order  an  exploration  of  the  far  West,  and  in 
1842  Lieutenant  Fremont  was  sent  to  see  if  the  South  Pass  of 
the  Eocky  Mountains,  the  usual  crossing  place,  would  best 
accommodate  the  coming  emigration.  He  set  out  from  Kansas 
City  (then  a  frontier  hamlet,  now  a  prosperous  city)  with  Kit 
Carson,  a  famous  hunter,  for  guide,  and  following  the  wagon 
trails  of  those  who  had  gone  before  him,  made  his  way  to  the 
pass.  He  found  its  ascent  so  gradual  that  his  party  hardly 
knew  when  they  reached  the  summit.  Passing  through  it  to 
the  valley  beyond,  he  climbed  the  great  peak  which  now  bears 
his  name  and  stands  13,570  feet  above  the  sea. 

Though  Fremont  discovered  no  new  route,  he  did  much  to 
dispel  the  popular  idea  created  by  Long  that  the  plains  were 
barren,  and  the  American  Desert  began  to  shrink.  In  1843 
Fremont  was  sent  out  again.  Making  his  way  westward  through 
the  South  Pass,  where  his  work  ended  in  1842,  he  turned  south 
ward  to  visit  Great  Salt  Lake,  and  then  pushed  on  to  Walla 
Walla  on  the  Columbia  River  (see  map  on  p.  330).  Thence  he 
went  on  to  the  Dalles,  and  then  by  boat  to  Fort  Vancouver, 
and  then,  after  returning  to  the  Dalles,  southward  to  Sutter's 
Fort  in  the  Sacramento  valley,  and  so  back  to  the  States  in 
1844. 

In  1845  Fremont,  who  had  now  won  the  name  of  "Path 
finder,"  was  sent  out  a  third  time,  and  crossing  what  are  now 
Nebraska  and  Utah,  reached  the  vicinity  of  Monterey  in  Cali 
fornia.  The  Mexican  authorities  ordered  him  out  of  the  coun 
try.  But  he  spent  the  winter  in  the  mountains,  and  in  the 
spring  was  on  his  way  to  Oregon,  when  a  messenger  from 
Washington  overtook  him,  and  he  returned  to  Sutter's  Fort. 

370.  The  Bear  State  Republic.  —  This  was  in  June,  1846. 
Humors  of  war  between  Mexico  and  the  United  States  were 
then  flying  thick  and  fast,  and  the  American  settlers  in  Cali 
fornia,  fearing  they  would  be  attacked,  revolted,  and  raising 
a  flag  on  which  an  image  of  a  grizzly  bear  was  colored  in 


EXPANSION   OF   THE    SLAVE    AREA 


333 


red  paint,  proclaimed  California  an  independent  republic. 
These  Bear  State  republicans  were  protected  and  aided  by 
Fremont  and  Commodore  Stockton,  who  was  on  the  Cali 
fornia  coast  with  a  fleet,  and  together  they  held  California 
till  Kearny  arrived. 

371.    Terms  of  Peace.  —  Thus  when  the  time  came  to  make 
peace,  our  armies  were  in  military  possession  of  vast  stretches 


TERRITORY 

— .    CEDED  BY 
MEXICO 
1848  and  1853 


of  Mexican  territory  which  Polk  refused  to  give  up.  Mexico, 
of  course,  was  forced  to  yield,  and  in  February,  1848,  at  a 
little  place  near  the  city  of  Mexico,  called  Guadalupe  Hidalgo, 
a  treaty  was  signed  by  which  Mexico  gave  up  the  land  and 
received  in  return  $15,000,000.  The  United  States  was  also 
to  pay  claims  our  citizens  had  against  Mexico  to  the  amount 


334  THE   LONG  STRUGGLE    WITH  SLAVERY 

of  $3,500,000.     This  added  522,568  square  miles  to  the  public 
domain.1 

372.  The  Gadsden  Purchase.  —  When  the  attempt  was  made 
to  run  the  boundary  line  from  the  Bio  Grande  to. the   Gila 
River,  so  many  difficulties  occurred  that  in  1853  a  new  treaty 
was  made  with  Mexico,  and  the  present  boundary  established 
from  the  Bio  Grande  to  the  Gulf  of  California.     The  line  then 
agreed  on  was  far  south  of  the  Gila  River,  and  for  this  new 
tract  of  land,  45,535  square   miles,  the  United   States   paid 
Mexico  $10,000,000.     It  is  generally  called  the  Gadsden  Pur 
chase,  after  James  Gadsden,  who  negotiated  it. 

Much  of  this  territory  acquired  in  1848,  especially  New 
Mexico  and  California,  had  long  been  settled  by  the  Spaniards. 
But  the  acquisition  of  it  by  the  United  States  at  once  put  an 
end  to  the  old  Mexican  government,  and  made  it  necessary 
for  Congress  to  provide  new  governments.  There  must  be 
American  governors,  American  courts,  American  judges,  cus 
tomhouses,  revenue  laws ;  in  a  word,  there  must  be  a  complete 
change  from  the  Mexican  way  of  governing  to  the  American 
way.  To  do  this  ought  not  to  have  been  a  hard  thing;  but 
Mexico  had  abolished  slavery  in  all  this  territory  in  1827.  It 
was  free  soil,  and  such  the  anti-extension-of-slavery  people  of 
the  North  insisted  on  keeping  it.  The  proslavery  people  of 
the  South,  on  the  other  hand,  insisted  that  it  should  be  open 
to  slavery,  and  that  any  slaveholder  should  be  allowed  to  emi 
grate  to  the  new  territory  with  his  slaves  and  not  have  them 
set  free.  The  political  question  of  the  time  thus  became,  Shall, 
or  shall  not,  slavery  exist  in  New  Mexico  and  California  ? 

373.  The  Free-soil  Party.  —  As  a  President  to  succeed  Polk 
was  to  be  elected   in   1848,  the  two  great  parties  did  their 
best  to  keep  the  troublesome  question  of  slavery  out  of  poli 
tics.     When  the  Whig  convention  met,  it  positively  refused  to 
make  a  platform,  and  nominated  General  Zachary  Taylor  of 

1  This  new  territory  included  not  only  the  present  California  and  New 
Mexico,  but  also  Nevada,  Arizona,  Utah,  and  parts  of  Colorado  and 
Wyoming. 


EXPANSION   OF   THE    SLAVE   AREA  335 

Louisiana,  and  Millard  Fillmore  of  New  York,  without  a  state 
ment  of  party  principles. 

When  the  Democratic  convention  met,  it  made  a  long  plat 
form,  but  said  nothing  about  slavery  in  the  territories,  and 
nominated  Lewis  Cass  of  Michigan  and  William  0.  Butler. 

This  refusal  of  the  two  parties  to  take  a  stand  on  the  ques 
tion  of  the  hour  so  displeased  many  Whigs  and  Wilmot-Pro- 
viso  Democrats  that  they  held  a  convention  at  Buffalo,  where 
the  old  Liberty  party  joined  them,  and  together  they  formed 
the  "Free-soil  party."  They  nominated  Martin  Van  Buren 
and  Charles  F.  Adams,  and  in  their  platform  made  four  im 
portant  declarations : 

1.  That  Congress  has  no  more  power  to  make  a  slave,  than  to 

make  a  king. 

2.  That  there  must  be  "  free  soil  for  a  free  people." 

3.  "  No  more  slave  states,  no  more  slave  territories." 

4.  That  we   will    inscribe   on   our   banners   "Free    soil,   free 

speech,  free  labor,  and  free  men." 

They  also  asked  for  cheaper  postage,  and  for  free  grants  of 
land  to  actual  settlers. 

The  Whigs  won  the  election. 

374.  Zachary  Taylor,  Twelfth  President.  —  Taylor  and  Fill- 
more  were  inaugurated  on  March  5, 1849,  because  the  4th  came 
on  Sunday.     Their  election  and  the  triumph 

of  the  Whigs  now  brought  on  a  crisis  in  the 
question  of  slavery  extension. 

375.  State  of  Feeling  in  the  South.  —  South 
ern  men,  both  Whigs  and  Democrats,  were 
convinced  that  an  attempt  would  be  made  by 
Northern  and  WTestern  men  opposed   to  the 
extension  of  slavery  to  keep  the  new  territory 

free  soil.     Efforts  were  at  once  made  to  pre-       Zachary  Taylor 
vent  this.     At  a  meeting  of  Southern  members  of  Congress,  an 
address  written  by  Calhoun  was  adopted  and  signed,  and  pub 
lished  all  over  the  country.     It 


330       THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

1.  Complained  of  the  difficulty  of  capturing  slaves  when  they 

escaped  to  the  free  states. 

2.  Complained  of  the  constant  agitation  of  the  slavery  ques 

tion  by  the  abolitionists. 

3.  And  demanded  that  the  territories  should  be  open  to  slavery. 

A  little  later,  in  1849,  the  legislature  of  Virginia  adopted 
resolutions  setting  forth : 

1.  That  "the  attempt  to  enforce  the  Wilmot  Proviso"  would 

rouse  the  people  of  Virginia  to  "  determined  resistance  at 
all  hazards  and  to  the  last  extremity." 

2.  That  the  abolition  of   the  slave  trade   in   the  District  of 

Columbia  would  be  a  direct  attack  on  tl^e  institutions 
of  the  Southern  States. 

The  Missouri  legislature  protested  against  the  principle  of 
the  Wilmot  Proviso,  and  instructed  her  senators  and  repre 
sentatives  to  vote  with  the  slaveholding  states.  The  Ten 
nessee  Democratic  State  Central  Committee,  in  an  address, 
declared  that  the  encroachments  of  their  Northern  brethren 
had  reached  a  point  where  forbearance  ceased  to  be  a  virtue. 
At  a  dinner  to  Senator  Butler,  in  South  Carolina,  one  of  the 
toasts  was  "  A  Southern  Confederacy." 

376.  State  of  Feeling  in  the  North. —Feeling  in  the  free 
states  ran  quite  as  high. 

1.  The  legislatures  of  every  one  of  them,  except  Iowa,1  re 

solved  that  Congress  had  power  and  was  in  duty  bound 
to  prohibit  slavery  in  the  territories. 

2.  Many  of  them  bade  their  congressmen  do  everything  possi 

ble  to  abolish  slavery  and  the  slave  trade  in  the  District 
of  Columbia. 

The  struggle  thus  coming  to  an  issue  in  the  summer  of  1849 
was  precipitated  by  a  most  unlooked-for  discovery  in  Cali 
fornia,  which  led  the  people  of  that  region  to  take  matters 
into  their  own  hands. 

1  Iowa  had  been  admitted  December  28,  1846. 


EXPANSION   OF   THE    SLAVE   AREA 


337 


377.  Discovery  of  Gold  in  California.  —  One  day  in  the  month 
of  January,  1848,  while  a  man  named  Marshall  was  construct 
ing  a  mill  race  in  the  valley  of  the  American  River  in  Cali 
fornia,  for  a  Swiss  immigrant  named  Sutter,  he  saw.  particles 
of  some  yellow  substance  shining  in  the  mud.  Picking  up  a 
few,  he  examined  them,  and  thinking  they  might  be  gold,  he 
gathered  some  more  and  set  off  for  Butter's  Fort,  where  the 
citv  of  Sacramento  now  stands. 


Sutler's  mill 

As  soon  as  he  had  reached  the  fort  and  found  Mr.  Sutter, 
the  two  locked  themselves  in  a  room  and  examined  the  yellow 
flakes  Marshall  had  brought.  They  were  gold!  But  to  keep 
the  secret  was  impossible.  A  Mormon  laborer,  watching  their 
excited  actions  at  the  mill  race,  discerned  the  secret,  and  then 
the  news  spread  fast,  and  the  whole  population  went  wild. 
Every  kind  of  business  stopped.  The  stores  were  shut.  Sailors 
left  the  ships.  Soldiers  defiantly  left  their  barracks,  and  by 


338 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


the  middle  of  the  summer  men  came  rushing  to  the  gold  fields 
from  every  part  of  the  Pacific  coast.  Later  in  the  year  reports 
reached  the  East,  but  so  slowly  did  news  travel  in  those 
days  that  it  was  not  till  Polk  in  his  annual  message  confirmed 
it,  that  people  really  believed  there  were  gold  fields  in  Cali 
fornia.  Then  the  rush  from  the  East  began.  Some  went 
overland,  some  crossed  by  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  some  went 
around  South  America,  filling  California  with  a  population  of 


San  Francisco  in  1847 

strong,  adventurous,  and  daring  men.     These  were  the  "  forty- 
niners." 

378.  The  Californians  make  a  Free-State  Constitution. — 
When  Taylor  heard  that  gold  hunters  were  hurrying  to  Cali 
fornia  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  he  was  very  anxious  to 
have  some  permanent  government  in  California;  and  encour 
aged  by  him  the  pioneers,  the  "forty-niners,"  made  a  free- 
state  constitution  in  1849  and  applied  for  admission  into  the 
Union.1 

1  For  an  account  of  this  movement  to  make  California  a  state,  see 
Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  111-116. 


EXPANSION   OF   THE   SLAVE   AREA  339 

379.  Clay  proposes  a  Compromise. — When  Congress  met  in 
1849  there  were  therefore  a  great  many  things  connected  with 
slavery  to  be  settled : 

1.  Southern  men  complained  that  the  existing  fugitive-slave 

law  was  not  enforced  in  the  free  states  and  that  runaway 
slaves  were  not  returned. 

2.  The  Northern  men  insisted  that  slavery  should  be  abol 

ished  in  the  District  of  Columbia. 

3.  Southern  men  demanded  the  right  to  go  into  any  territory 

of  the  United  States,  as  New  Mexico  or  Utah  or  even 
California,  and  take  their  slaves  with  them. 

4.  The  Free-soilers  demanded  that  there  should  be  no  more 

slave  states,  no  more  slave  territories. 

5.  The  North  wanted  California  admitted  as  a  free-soil  state. 

The  South  would  not  consent. 

So  violent  and  bitter  was  the  feeling  aroused  by  these  ques 
tions,  that  it  seemed  in  1850  as  if  the  Union  was  about  to  be 
broken  up,  and  that  there  were  to  be  two  republics,  —  a  North 
ern  one  made  up  of  free  states,  and  a  Southern  one  made  up 
of  slave  states. 

Happily  this  was  not  to  be ;  for  at  this  crisis  Henry  Clay, 
the  "Compromiser,"  the  "Pacificator,"  the  "Peacemaker,"  as 
he  was  fondly  called,  came  forward  with  a  plan  of  settlement. 

To  please  the  North,  he  proposed,  first,  that  California 
should  be  admitted  as  a  free  state;  second,  that  the  slave 
trade  —  that  is,  the  buying  and  selling  of  slaves  —  should  be 
abolished  in  the  District  of  Columbia.  To  please  the  South, 
he  proposed,  third,  that  there  should  be  a  new  and  very  strin 
gent  fugitive-slave  law;  fourth,  that  New  Mexico  and  Utah 
should  be  made  territories  without  reference  to  slavery  —  that 
is,  the  people  should  make  them  free  or  slave,  as  they  pleased. 
This  was  called  "  popular  sovereignty "  or  "  squatter  sover 
eignty."  Fifth,  that  as  Texas  claimed  so  much  of  New 
Mexico  as  was  east  of  the  Rio  Grande,  she  should  give  up  her 
claim  and  be  paid  money  for  so  doing. 


340      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

380,    Clay,  Calhoun,  Seward,  and  Webster  on  the  Compromise. 

-The  debate  on  the  compromise  was  a  great  one.  Clay's 
defense  of  his  plan  was  one  of  the  finest  speeches  he  ever 
made.1  Calhoun,  who  was  too  feeble  to  speak,  had  his  argu 
ment  read  by  another  senator.  Webster,  on  the  "7th  of 
March,"  made  the  famous  speech  which  still  bears  that  name. 
In  it  he  denounced  the  abolitionists  and  defended  the  com 
promise,  because,  he  said,  slavery  could  not  exist  in  such  an 
arid  country  as  New  Mexico.  William  H.  Seward  of  New 
York  spoke  for  the  Free-soilers  and  denounced  all  compro 
mise,  and  declared  that  the  territories  were  free  not  only  by  the 
Constitution,  but  by  a  "  higher  law  "  than  the  Constitution, 
the  law  of  justice  and  humanity.2 

After  these  great  speeches  were  made,  Clay's  plan  was  sent 
to  a  committee  of  thirteen,  from  which  came  seven  recom 
mendations  : 

1.  The  consideration  of  the  admission  of  any  new  state  or 

states  formed  out  of  Texas  to  be  postponed  till  they  pre 
sent  themselves  for  admission. 

2.  California  to  be  admitted  as  a  free  state. 

3.  Territorial  governments  without  the  Wilmot  Proviso  to  be 

established  in  New  Mexico  and  Utah. 

4.  The  combination  of  No.  2  and  No.  3  in  one  bill. 

5.  The  establishment  of   the   present   northern  and  western 

boundary  of  Texas.  In  return  for  ceding  her  claims  to 
New  Mexico,  Texas  to  receive  $10,000,000.  This  last 
provision  to  be  inserted  in  the  bill  provided  for  in  No.  4. 

6.  A  new  and  stringent  fugitive-slave  law. 

7.  Abolition  of  the  slave  trade,  but  not  of  slavery,  in  the  Dis 

trict  of  Columbia. 

Three  bills  to  carry  out  these  recommendations  were  pre 
sented  : 

1  Henry  Clay's  Works,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  602-634. 

2  Johnston's  American  Orations,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  123-219,  for  the  speeches 
of  Calhoun,  Webster,  and  Clay, 


EXPANSION   OF   THE   SLAVE   AREA  341 

1.  The  first  bill  provided  for  (a)  the  admission  of  California 

as  a  free  state ;  (6)  territorial  governments  for  New 
Mexico  and  Utah  without  any  restriction  on  slavery ; 
(e)  the  present  northern  and  western  boundary  for  Texas, 
with  a  gift  of  money.  President  Taylor  nicknamed  this 
"  the  Omnibus  Bill,"  because  of  its  many  provisions. 

2.  The  second  bill  prohibited  the  slave  trade,  but  not  slavery, 

in  the  District  of  Columbia. 

3.  The  third  provided  for  the  capture  and  delivery  of  fugitive- 

slaves. 

During  three  months  these  bills  were  hotly  debated,  and 
threats  of  disunion  and  violence  were  made  openly. 

381.  Death  of  Taylor;  Fillmore  becomes  President.  —  In   the 
midst  of  the  debate,  July  9, 1850,  Taylor  died,  and  Fillmore  was 
sworn  into  office.    Calhoun  had  died  in  March. 

Webster  was  made  Secretary  of  State  by  Fill- 
more.  In  some  respects  these  changes  helped 
on  the  measures,  all  of  which  were  carried 
through.  Two  of  them  were  of  great  impor 
tance. 

382.  Popular  Sovereignty.  —  The  first  pro 
vided    that   the    two    new   territories,   New 
Mexico  and  Utah,  when  fit  to  be  admitted  as 

states,  should  come  in  with  or  without  slavery      Millard  Fillmore 
as  their  constitutions  might  determine;  meantime,  the  question 
whether  slavery  could  or  could  not  exist  there,  if  it  arose,  was 
to  be  settled  by  the  Supreme  Court. 

383.  The  Fugitive-Slave  Law.  —  The  other  important  measure 
of  the  compromise  was  the  fugitive-slave  law.    The  old  fugitive- 
slave  law  enacted  in  1793  had  depended  for  its  execution  on 
state  judges.     This  new  law  of  1850 

1.  Gave  United   States  commissioners  power  to  turn  over  a 

colored  man  or  woman  to  anybody  who  claimed  the  negro 
as  an  escaped  slave. 

2.  Provided  that  the  negro  could  not  give  testimony. 


342 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


3.  "  Commanded  "  all  good  citizens,  when  summoned,  to  aid  in 

the  capture  of  the  slave,  or,  if  necessary,  in  his  delivery 
to  his  owners. 

4.  Prescribed  fine  and  imprisonment  for  anybody   who   har 

bored  a  fugitive  slave  or  prevented  his  recapture. 


NEW    MEX     CO    TER/RITORY 


from       110  Greenwich  105 


No  sooner  was  this  law  enacted  than  the  slave  owners  began 
to  use  it,  and  during  the  autumn  of  1850  a  host  of  "slave 
catchers  "  and  "  man  hunters, "  as  they  were  called,  invaded 
the  North,  and  negroes  who  had  escaped  twenty  or  thirty 
years  before  were  hunted  up  and  dragged  back  to  slavery  by 
the  marshals  of  the  United  States.  This  so  excited  the  free 
negroes  and  the  people  of  the  North,  that  several  times  during 
1851  they  rose  and  rescued  a  slave  from  his  captors.  In  New 
York  a  slave  named  Hamet,  in  Boston  one  named  Shadrach,  in 
Syracuse  one  named  Jerry,  and  at  Ottawa,  Illinois,  one  named 


EXPANSION   OF  THE    SLAVE   AREA  343 

Jim,  regained  their  liberty  in  this  way.  So  strong  was  public 
feeling  that  Vermont  in  1850  passed  a  "Personal  Liberty  Law," 
for  the  protection  of  negroes  claimed  as  slaves.1 

The  Xorth  was  now  becoming  strongly  antislavery.  It  had 
long  been  opposed  to  the  extension  of  slavery,  but  was  now 
becoming  opposed  to  its  very  existence.  How  deep  this  feel 
ing  was,  became  apparent  in  the  summer  of  1852,  when  Mrs. 
Harriet  Beecher  Stowe  published  her  story  of  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin.  It  was  not  so  much  a  picture  of  what  slavery  was, 
as  of  what  it  might  be,  and  was  so  powerfully  written  that  it 
stirred  and  aroused  thousands  of  people  in  the  North  who,  till 
then,  had  been  quite  indifferent.  In  a  few  months  everybody 
was  laughing  and  crying  over  "  Topsy  "  and  "  Eva  "  and  "  Uncle 
Tom  " ;  and  of  those  who  read  it  great  numbers  became  aboli 
tionists. 

SUMMARY 

1.   The  Mexican  state  of  Texas  revolts  and  in  1837  becomes  independent. 
2    President  Tyler  secretly  negotiates   a  treaty  for  the  annexation  of 
Texas  to  the  United  States,  but  this  is  defeated  (1844). 

3.  The  labors  of  Elijah  White  and  others  lead  to  the  rapid  settlement 

of  the  Oregon  country. 

4.  The  annexation  of  Texas  and  the  occupation  of  the  whole  of  Oregon 

become  questions  in  the  campaign  of  1844.  The  Democrats  carry 
the  election,  Texas  is  annexed,  and  the  Oregon  country  is  divided 
between  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States. 

5.  The  question  of  the  boundary  of  Texas  brings  on  the  Mexican  War, 

and  in  1848  another  vast  stretch  of  country  is  acquired. 

6.  The  acquisition  of  this  new  territory,  which  was  free  soil,  causes  a 

struggle  for  the  introduction  of  slavery  into  it. 

7.  The  refusal  of  the  Whigs  and  Democrats  to  take  issue  on  slavery  in 

the  territories  leads  to  the  formation  of  the  Free-soil  party. 

8.  The  discovery  of  gold  in  California,  the  rush  of  people  thither,  and  the 

formation  of  a  free  state  seeking  admission  into  the  Union  force 
the  question  of  slavery  on  Congress. 

9.  In  1850  an  attempt  is  made  to  settle  it  by  the  "  Compromise  of  1850." 

1  On  the  Compromise  of  1850  read  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States, 
Vol.  L,  pp.  104-189  ;  .Schurz's  Life  of  Clay,  Vol.  H.,  Chap.  26.  Do  not 
fail  to  read  the  speeches  of  Calhoun,  Clay,  Webster,  Seward ;  also 
Lodge's  Life  of  Webster,  pp.  264-332.  For  the  rescue  cases  read  Wilson's 
Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power  in  America,  Chap.  26. 


344 


THE    LONG   STRUGGLE    WITH    SLAVERY 


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EXPANSION   OF   THE   SLAVE   AREA 


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Defeated,  1848. 

Complaints  of  the  South 

against  the  North  : 
1.  Fugitive  slaves. 
2.  Slavery  in  District 
of  Columbia. 
(3.  Territory  acquired 
from  Mexico  to  be 
open  to  slavery. 

1  wi,;,™  «-i-^w^4-  . 

1  &k  ! 

COMPROMIS 
California  a  free  state. 
Popular  sovereignty  in  terri' 
No  slave  trade  in  District  oi 

Texas  takes  present  bounda] 

Two  new  territories,  Utah  a 

New  fugitive-slave  law. 

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3 

CHAPTER   XXV 


THE   TERRITORIES  BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL 

384.  Franklin  Pierce,  Fourteenth  President.  —  Although  the 
struggle  with  slavery  was  thus  growing  more  and  mo-re  serious, 
the  two  great  parties  pretended  to  consider  the  question  as 
finally  settled.     In  1852  the  Democrats  nominated  Franklin 
Pierce  and  William  R.  King,  and  declared  in  their  platform 
that  they  would  "  abide  by  and  adhere  to  "  the  Compromise  of 

1850,  and  would  "  resist  all  attempts  at  renew 
ing,  in  Congress  or  out  of  it,  the  agitation  of 
the  slavery  question."  The  Whigs  nominated 
General  Winfield  Scott,  and  declared  that  they 
approved  the  fugitive-slave  law,  and  accepted 
the  compromise  measures  of  1850  as  "  a  settle 
ment  in  principle  "  of  the  slavery  question,  and 
would  do  all  they  could  to  prevent  any  further 
discussion  of  it. 
So  far  as  the  Whigs  were  concerned,  the  question  was 

settled;  for  the  Northern  people,  angry  at  their  acceptance  of 

the  Compromise  of  1850  and  the  fugitive-slave  law,  refused  to 

vote  for  Scott,  and  Pierce  was  elected.1 

The  Free-soilers  had  nominated  John  P.  Hale  and  George 

W.  Julian. 

385.  The  Nebraska  Bill.  —  Pierce  was  inaugurated  March  4, 
1853.     He,  too,  believed  that  all  questions  relating  to  slavery 
were  settled.     But  he  had  not  been  many  months   in  office 
when  the  old  quarrel  was  raging  as  bitterly  as  ever.     In  1853 

1  Pierce  carried  every  state  except  Massachusetts,  Vermont,  Tennessee, 
and  Kentucky. 

346 


Franklin  Pierce 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL  347 

all  that  part  of  our  country  which  lies  between  the  Missouri 
Eiver  and  the  Rocky  Mountains,  the  south  boundary  of  Kan 
sas  and  49°,  was  wilderness,  known  as  the  Platte  country,  and 
was  without  any  kind  of  territorial  government.  In  January, 
1854,  a  bill  to  organize  this  great  piece  of  country  and  call  it 
the  territory  of  Nebraska  was  reported  to  the  Senate  by  the 
Committee  on  Territories,  of  which  Stephen  A.  Douglas  of 
Illinois  was  chairman.  Every  foot  of  it  was  north  of  36°  30', 
and  according  to  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  free  soil.  But 
the  bill  provided  for  popular  sovereignty;  that  is,  for  the 
right  of  the  people  of  Nebraska,  when  they  made  a  state,  to 
have  it  free  or  slave,  as  they  pleased. 

386.  The  Kansas-Nebraska  Law.  —  An  attempt  was  at  once 
made  to  prevent  this.     But  Douglas   recalled  his   bill   and 
brought  in  another,  providing  for  two  territories,  one  to  be 
called  Kansas l  and  the  other  Nebraska,  expressly  repealing 
the  Missouri  Compromise,2  and  opening  the  country  north  of 
36°  30'  to  slavery.3     The  Free-soilers,  led  on  by  Salmon  P. 
Chase  of  Ohio,  Seward  of  New  York,  and  Charles  Sumner  of 
Massachusetts,  did  all  they  could  to  defeat  the  bill;  but  it 
passed,  and  Pierce  signed  it  and  made  it  law.4 

387.  The  Struggle  for  Kansas.  —  Thus  was  it  ordained  that 
Kansas  and  Nebraska,  once  expressly  set  apart  as  free  soil, 
should  become  free  or  slave  states  according  as  they  were 
settled  while   territories   by  antislavery  or   proslavery  men. 
And  now  began  a  seven  years'  struggle  for  Kansas.     "Come 

1  The  northern  and  southern  boundaries  of  Kansas  were  those  of  the 
present  state,  but  it  extended  westward  to  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

2  It  declared  that  the  slavery  restriction  of  the  Missouri  Compromise 
"  was  suspended  by  the  principles  of  the  legislation  of  1850,  commonly 
called  the  compromise  measures,  and  is  hereby  declared  inoperative." 

8  The  "true  intent  and  meaning"  of  this  act,  said  the  law,  is,  "  not  to 
legislate  slavery  into  any  territory  or  state,  nor  to  exclude  it  therefrom,  but 
to  leave  the  people  thereof  perfectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their 
domestic  institutions  in  their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States."  Read  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States, 
Vol.  I.,  pp.  425-490. 

4  May  30,  1854. 


THE  UNITED  STATES 

in  1851 

SEVENTY  FIVE  YEARS  AFTER  INDEPENDENCE 

Showing  Railroads  and 
Overland  Routes 


350      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

on,  then,"  said  Seward  of  New  York  in  a  speech  against  the 
Kansas  Bill;  "Come  on,  then,  gent]emen  of  the  slave  states 
Since  there  is  no  escaping  your  challenge,  I  accept  it  or 
behalf  of  freedom.  We  will  engage  in  competition  for  th( 
virgin  soil  of  Kansas,  and  God  give  the  victory  to  the  sid< 
that  is  stronger  in  numbers  as  it  is  in  the  right." 

This  described  the  situation  exactly.  The  free-state  mer 
of  the  North  and  the  slave-state  men  of  the  South  were  to  rusl 
into  Kansas  and  struggle  for  its  possession.  The  moment  tin 
law  opening  Kansas  for  settlement  was  known  in  Missouri, 
numbers  of  men  crossed  the  Missouri  River,  entered  th< 
territory,  held  squatters'  meetings,1  drove  a  few  stakes  intc 
the  ground  to  represent  " squatter  claims,"  went  home,  anc 
called  on  the  people  of  the  South  to  hurry  into  Kansas.  Manj 
did  so,  and  began  to  erect  tents  and  huts  on  the  Missouri  Rive] 
at  a  place  which  they  called  Atchison.2 

But  the  men  of  the  North  had  not  been  idle,  and  in  July  i 
band  of  free-state  men,  sent  on  by  the  New  England  Emigran 
Aid  Society,8  entered  Kansas  and  founded  a  town  on  th< 
Kansas  River  some  miles  to  the  south  and  west  of  Ahchison 
Other  emigrants  came  in  a  few  weeks  later,  and  their  collectioi 
of  tents  received  the  name  of  Lawrence.4 

What  was  thus  taking  place   at  Lawrence  happened  else 

1  At  one  of  their  meetings  it  was  resolved  :  "  That  we  will  afford  pro 
tection  to  no  abolitionist  as  a  settler  of  this  country."     "  That  we  recog 
nize  the  institution  of  slavery  as  already  existing  in  this  territory,  an< 
advise  stockholders  to  introduce  their  property  as  early  as  possible." 

2  Called  after  Senator  Atchison  of  Missouri. 

8  The  New  England  Emigrant  Aid  Society  was  founded  in  1854  b; 
Hon.  Eli  Thayer  of  Worcester,  Mass.,  in  order  "to  plant  a  free  state  ii 
Kansas,"  by  aiding  antislavery  men  to  go  out  there  and  settle. 

4  After  Amos  A.  Lawrence,  secretary  of  the  Aid  Society.  It  was  a  cit; 
of  tents.  Not  a  building  existed.  Later  came  the  log  cabin,  which  wa 
a  poor  affair,  as  timber  was  scarce.  The  sod  hut  now  so  common  in  th 
Northwest  was  not  thought  of.  In  the  early  days  the  "hay  tent"  wa 
the  usual  house,  and  was  made  by  setting  up  two  rows  of  poles,  the 
bringing  their  tops  together,  thatching  the  roof  and  sides  with  hay.  Th 
two  gable  ends  (in  which  were  the  windows  and  doors)  were  of  sod. 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME    SLAVE   SOIL  351 

where,  so  that  by  October,  1854,  that  part  of  Kansas  along  the 
Missouri  River  was  held  by  the  slave-state  men,  and  the  part 
south  of  the  Kansas  River  by  the  free-state  men.1 

In  November  of  the  same  year  the  struggle  began.  There 
was  to  be  an  election  of  a  territorial  delegate2  to  represent 
Kansas  in  Congress,  and  a  day  or  two  before  the  time  set  for 
it  the  Missourians  came  over  the  border  in  armed  bands,  took 
possession  of  the  polls,  voted  illegally,  and  elected  a  pro- 
slavery  delegate. 

388.  Kansas  a  Slave  Territory.  —  The  election  of  members 
of  the  territorial  legislature  took  place  in  March,  1855,  and 
for  this  the  Missourians  made  great  preparations.  On  the 
principle  of  popular  sovereignty  the  people  of  Kansas  were 
to  decide  whether  the  territory  should  be  slave  or  free. 
Should  the  majority  of  the  legislature  consist  of  free-state 
men,  then  Kansas  would  be  a  free  territory.  Should  a 
majority  of  proslavery  men  be  chosen,  then  Kansas  was 
doomed  to  have  slavery  fastened  on  her,  and  this  the 
Missourians  determined  should  be  done.  For  weeks  before 
the  election,  therefore,  the  border  counties  of  Missouri  were 
all  astir.  Meetings  were  held,  and  secret  societies,  called  Blue 
Lodges,  were  formed,  the  members  of  which  were  pledged  to 
enter  Kansas  on  the  day  of  election,  take  possession  of  the 
polls,  and  elect  a  proslavery  legislature.  The  plan  was 
strictly  carried  out,  and  as  election  day  drew  near,  the  Mis 
sourians,  fully  armed,  entered  Kansas  in  companies,  squads, 
and  parties,  like  an  invading  army,  voted,  and  then  went 
home  to  Missouri.  Every  member  of  the  legislature  save 
one  was  a  proslavery  man,  and  when  that  body  met,  all  the 
slave  laws  of  Missouri  were  adopted  and  slavery  was  formally 
established  in  Kansas. 

1  The   proslavery   towns   were    Atchison,    Leaven  worth,   Lecompton, 
Kickapoo.     The  antislavery  towns  were  Lawrence,  Topeka,  Manhattan, 
Waubunsee,  Hampden,  Ossawatomie. 

2  Each  territory  is  allowed  to  send  a  delegate  to  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  where  he  can  speak,  but  not  vote. 


352      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

389.  The   Topeka   Free-State   Constitution.  —  The    free-state 
men  repudiated  the  bogus  legislature,  held  a  convention  at 
Topeka,  made  a  free-state  constitution,  and  submitted  it  to 
the  popular  vote.     The  people  having  ratified  it  (of  course  no 
proslavery  men  voted),  a  governor  and  legislature  were  chosen. 
When  the  legislature  met,  senators  were  elected  and  Congress 
was  asked  to  admit  Kansas  into  the  Union  as  a  state. 

390.  Personal  Liberty   Laws ;    the   Underground   Railroad.  — 
The  feeling  of  the  people  of  the  free  states  toward  slavery  can 
be  seen  from  many  signs.     The  example  set  by  Vermont  in 
1850  was  followed  in  1854  by  Rhode  Island,  Connecticut,  and 
Michigan,  and  in  1855  by  Maine  and  Massachusetts,  in  each  of 
which  were  passed  "  Personal  Liberty  laws,"  designed  to  pre 
vent  free  negroes  from  being  carried  into  slavery  on  the  claim 
that  they  were  fugitive  slaves.     Certain  state  officers  were  re 
quired  to  act  as  counsel  for  any  one  arrested  as  a  fugitive,  and 
to  see  that  he  had  a  fair  trial  by  jury.     To  seize  a  free  negro 
with  intent  to  reduce  him  to  slavery  was  made  a  crime. 

Another  sign  of  the  times  was  the  sympathy  manifested  for 
the  operations  of  what  was  called  the  Underground  Railroad. 
It  was,  of  course,  not  a  railroad  at  all,  but  an  organization  by 
which  slaves  escaping  from  their  masters  were  aided  in  getting 
across  the  free  states  to  Canada. 

391.  Breaking  up  of  Old  Parties. — Thus  matters  stood  when, 
in  1856,  the  time  came  to  elect  a  President,  and  found  the  old 
parties  badly  disorganized.     The  political  events  of  four  years 
had  produced  great  changes.     The  death  of  Clay l  and  Web 
ster  2  deprived  the  Whigs  of  their  oldest  and  greatest  leaders. 
The  earnest  support  that  party  gave  to  the  Compromise  of 
1850  and  the  execution  of  the  fugitive-slave  law  estranged 
thousands  of  voters  in  the  free  states.     The  Kansas-Nebraska 
Bill,  opposed  as  it  was  by  every  Northern  Whig,  completed  the 
ruin  and  left  the  party  a  wreck. 

But  the  Democrats  had  also  suffered  because  of  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  law  and   the   repeal  of  the  Compromise  of  1820. 
1  June  29,  1852.  2  October  24,  1852. 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL  353 

No  anti-extension-of-slavery  Democrat  could  longer  support  the 
old  party.  Thousands  had  therefore  broken  away,  and,  acting 
with  the  dissatisfied  Whigs,  formed  an  unorganized  opposition 
known  as  u  Anti-Nebraska  men." 

392.  The  Movement  against  Immigrants.  —  Many  old  Whigs, 
however,  could  not  bring  themselves  to  vote  with  Democrats. 
These  joined  the  American  or  Know-nothing  party.    From  the 
close  of  the  Revolution  there  had  never  been  a  year  when  a 
greater  or  less  number  of  foreigners  did  not  come  to  our  shores. 
After  1820  the  numbers  who  came  each  twelvemonth  grew 
larger  and  larger,  till  they  reached  30,000  in  1830,  and  60,000 
in  1836,  while  in  the  decade  1830-1840  more  than  500,000 
immigrants  landed  at  New  York  city  alone. 

As  the  newcomers  hurried  westward  into  the  cities  of  the 
Mississippi  valley,  the  native  population  was  startled  by  the 
appearance  of  men  who  often  could  not  speak  our  language. 
In  Cincinnati  in  1840  one  half  the  voters  were  of  foreign  birth. 
The  cry  was  now  raised  that  our  institutions,  our  liberties,  our 
system  of  government,  were  at  the  mercy  of  men  from  the 
monarchical  countries  of  Europe.  A  demand  was  made  for  a 
change  in  the  naturalization  law,  so  that  no  foreigner  could 
become  a  citizen  till  he  had  lived  here  twenty-one  years. 

393.  The  American  Republicans  or  Native  Americans.  —  Neither 
the  W^higs  nor  the  Democrats  would  endorse  this  demand,  so 
the  people  of  Louisiana  in  1841  called  a  state  convention  and 
founded  the  American  Republican,  or,  as  it  was  soon  called, 
the  Native  American  party.     Its  principles  were 

1.  Put  none  but  native  Americans  in  office. 

2.  Require  a  residence  of  twenty-one  years  in  this  country 

before  naturalization. 

3.  Keep  the  Bible  in  the  schools. 

4.  Protect  from  abuse  the  proceedings  necessary  to  get  naturali 

zation  papers. 

As  the  members  would  not  tell  what  the  secrets  of  this  party 
were,  and  very  often  would  not  say  whom  they  were  going  to 


" 

354      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERYj 


vote  for,  and  when  questioned  would  answer  "I  don't  know," 
it  got  the  name  of  "Know-nothing"  party.1 

For  a  time  the  party  flourished  greatly  and  secured  six 
members  of  the  House  of  Representatives,  then  it  declined 
in  power ;  but  the  immense  increase  in  immigration  between 
1846  and  1850  again  revived  it,  and  somewhere  in  New  Yoik 
city  in  1852  a  secret,  oath-bound  organization,  with  sigfs 
grips,  and  passwords,  was  founded,  and  spread  with  sii 
rapidity  that  in  1854  it  carried  the  elections  in  Massachus 
New  York,  and  Delaware.  Next  year  (1855)  it  elected 
governors  and  legislatures  of  eight  states,  and  nearly  car  'ied 
six  more.  Encouraged  by  these  successes,  the  leaders  d(  ter- 
mined  to  enter  the  campaign  of  1856,  and  called  a  party 
vention  which  nominated  Millard  Fillmore  and  Andrew  Jac 
Donelson.  Delegates  from  seven  states  left  the  convention 


on- 
son 
be- 


oe-     j 

cause  it  would  not  stand  by  the  Missouri  Compromise,  and  tak-   j 
ing  the  name  North  Americans  nominated  N.  P.  Ban£s.     He 
would  not  accept,  and  the  bolters  then  joined  t}re~Republicans.\x 

394.    Beginning  of  the  Republican  Party.  —  As  early  as 
when    the   Kansas-Nebraska   Bill   was   before   Congress,   the 
question  was  widely  discussed  all  over  the  North  and  West, 
whether  the  time  had  not  come  to  form  a  new  party  out  of  x 
the  wreck  of  the  old.     With  this  in  view  a  meeting  of  citizens  <~ 
of  all  parties  was  held  at  Ripon,  Wisconsin,  at  which  the  >. 
formation  of  a  new  party  on  the  slavery  issue  was  recom 
mended,  and  the  name  Republican  suggested.     This  was  before  x 
the  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska  Bill. 

After  its  passage  a  thousand  citizens  of  Michigan  sign1 
call  for  a  state  mass  meeting  at  Jackson,  where  a  state  pa 
was  formed,  named  Republican,  and  a  state  ticket  nominated, 
on  which  were  Free-soilers,  Whigs,  and  Anti-Nebraska  Demo 
crats.     Similar  "fusion  tickets"  were  adopted  in  Wisconsin 
and  Vermont,  where  the  name  Republican  was  used,  and  in 
Iowa,  Illinois,  Indiana,  Ohio,  New  Hampshire,  and  Connecticut. 

1  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  51-58  ;  McMaster's 
With  the  Fathers,  pp.  87-106. 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL 


355 


The  success  of  the  new  party  in  Wisconsin  and  Michigan  in 
1854,  and  its  yet  greater  success  in  1855,  led  the  chairmen  of 
the  Republican  state  committees  of  Ohio,  Pennsylvania,  Mas 
sachusetts,  Vermont,  and  Wisconsin  to  issue  a  call  for  an 
informal  convention  at  Pittsburg  on  February  22,  1856.  At 
this  meeting  the  National  Republican  party  was  formed,  and 
from  it  went  a  call  for  a  national  nominating  convention  to 
meet  (June  17,  1856)  at  Philadelphia,  where  John  C.  Fre"- 
mont  and  William  L.  Dayton  were  nominated. 

The  Free-soilers  had  joined  the  Republicans  and  so  disap 
peared  from  politics  as  a  party. 

The  Whigs,  or  "Silver  Grays,"  met  and  endorsed  Fillmore. 

The  Democrats  nominated  James  Buchanan  and  John  C 
Breckinridge  and  carried  the  election.  The  Whigs  and  tl 
Know-nothings  then  disappeared  from  national  politics. 

395.  James  Buchanan,  Fifteenth  Presi 
dent;  the  "  Dred  Scott  Decision."  —  When 
Buchanan  and  Breckinridge  were  inaugu 
rated,  March  4,  1857,  certain  matters  re 
garding  slavery  were  considered  as  legally 
settled  forever,  as  follows : 

1.  Foreign  slave  trade  forbidden. 

2.  Slave  trade  between  the  states  allowed. 

3.  Fugitive  slaves  to  be  returned. 

4.  Whether  a  state  should  permit  or  abolish 

slavery  to  be  determined  by  the  state. 

5.  Squatter  sovereignty  to  be  allowed  in  Kansas  and  Ne 

braska,  Utah  and  New  Mexico  territories. 

6.  The  people  in  a  territory  to  determine  whether  they  would 

have  a  slave  or  a  free  state  when  they  made  a  state  con 
stitution. 

Now  there  were  certain  questions  regarding  slavery  which 
were  not  settled,  and  one  of  them  was  this :    If  a  slave  is 
taken  by  his  master  to  a  free  state  and  lives  there  for  a 
while,  does  he  become  free  ? 
McM.  HIST.  — 20 


James  Buchanan 


350  THE    LONG    STRUGGLE    WITH   SLAVERY 

To  this  the  Supreme  Court  gave  the  answer  two  days  after 
Buchanan  was  inaugurated.  A  slave  by  the  name  of  Dred 
Scott  had  been  taken  by  his  master  from  the  slave  state  of 
Missouri  to  the  free  state  of  Illinois,  and  then  to  the  free  soil 
of  Minnesota,  and  then  back  to  the  state  of  Missouri,  where 
Scott  sued  for  his  freedom,  on  the  ground  that  his  residence 
on  free  soil  had  made  him  a  free  man.  Two  questions  of 
vast  importance  were  thus  raised: 

1.  Could  a  negro  whose  ancestors  had  been   sold  as  slaves 

become  a  citizen  of  one  of  the  states  in  the  Union  ?  For 
unless  Dred  Scott  was  a  citizen  of  Missouri,  where  he  then 
lived,  he  could  not  sue  in  the  United  States  court. 

2.  Did  Congress  have  power  to  enact  the  Missouri  Compromise  ? 

For  if  it  did  not  then  the  restriction  of  slavery  north  of 
36°  30'  was  illegal,  and  Dred  Scott's  residence  in  Minnesota 
did  not  make  him  free. 

From  the  lower  courts  the  case  came  on  appeal  to  the  Supreme 
Court,  which  decided 

1.  That  Dred  Scott  was  not  a  citizen,  and  therefore  could 

not  sue  in  the  United  States  courts.  His  residence  in 
Minnesota  had  not  made  him  free. 

2.  That  Congress  could  not  shut  slave  property  out  of  the 

territories  any  more  than  it  could  shut  out  a  horse  or 
a  cow. 

3.  That  the  piece  of  legislation  known  as  the  Missouri  Com 

promise  of  1820  was  null  and  void.  This  confirmed  all 
that  had  been  gained  for  slavery  by  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
Act  of  1854,  and  opened  to  slavery  Oregon  and  Washing 
ton,  which  were  free  territories. 

396.  Effect  of  the  Dred  Scott  Decision.  —  Hundreds  of  thou 
sands  of  copies  of  this  famous  decision  were  printed  at  once 
and  scattered  broadcast  over  the  country  as  campaign  docu 
ments.  The  effect  was  to  fillUke^Southern  people  with  delight 
and  make  them  mfce  reckless  than  ever,  to  split  the  Demo- 

»* 


/VV    IT- 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME    SLAVE    SOIL 


357 


[<       EXPANSION  OF 
SLAVE  SOIL 

N  THE  UNITED  STATES 
1790-1860 


110  Longitude 


West  from        90  Greenwich 


cratic  party  in  the  North ;  to  increase  the  number  of  Repub 
licans  in  the  North,  and  make  them  more  determined  than 
ever  to  stop  the  spread  of  slavery  into  the  territories. 

397.  Struggle  for  Freedom  in  Kansas.  — We  left  Kansas  in 
1856  with  a  proslavery  governor  and  legislature  in  actual 
possession,  and  a  free-state  governor,  legislature,  and  senators 
seeking  recognition  at  Washington.  In  1857  there  were  so 
many  free-state  men  in  Kansas  that  they  elected  an  antislavery 
legislature.  But  just  before  the  proslavery  men  went  out  of 
power  they  made  a  proslavery  constitution,1  and  instead  of  sub- 

The  convention  met  at  the  town  of  Lecompton  ;  in  consequence  of 
which  the  constitution  is  known  as  the  "Lecompton  constitution." 


358      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

mitting  to  the  people  the  question,  Will  you,  or  will  you  not, 
have  this  constitution  ?  they  submitted  the  question,  Will  you 
have  this  constitution  with  or  without  slavery  ?  On  this  the 
free  settlers  would  not  vote,  and  so  it  was  adopted  with  slavery. 
But  when  the  antislavery  legislature  met  soon  after,  they 
ordered  the  question,  Will  you,  or  will  you  not,  have  this  con 
stitution  ?  to  be  submitted  to  the  people.  Then  the  free  set 
tlers  voted,  and  it  was  rejected  by  a  great  majority.  Buchanan, 
however,  paid  no  attention  to  the  action  of  the  free  settlers,  but 
sent  the  Lecompton  constitution  to  Congress  and  urged  it  to 
admit  Kansas  as  a  slave  state.  But  Senator  Douglas  of  Illinois 
came  forward  and  opposed  this,  because  to  force  a  slave  con 
stitution  on  the  people  of  Kansas,  after  they  had  voted  against 
it,  was  contrary  to  the  doctrine  of  "  popular  sovereignty."  He, 
with  the  aid  of  other  Northern  Democrats,  defeated  the  attempt, 
and  Kansas  remained  a  territory  till  1861. 

398.  The  Lincoln-Douglas  Debates.  —  The  term  of  Douglas  as 
senator  from  Illinois  was  to  expire  on  March  4,  1859.  The 
legislature  whose  duty  it  would  be  to  elect  his  successor  was 
itself  to  be  elected  in  1858.  The  Democrats,  therefore, 
announced  that  if  they  secured  a  majority  of  the  legislators, 
they  would  reelect  Douglas.  The  Republicans  declared  that 
if  they  secured  a  majority,  they  would  elect  Abraham  Lincoln 
United  States  senator.  The  real  question  of  the  campaign 
thus  became,  Will  the  people  of  Illinois  have  Stephen  A. 
Douglas  or  Abraham  Lincoln  for  senator  ? 1 

The  speech  making  opened  in  June,  1858,  when  Lincoln 
addressed  the  convention  that  nominated  him  at  Springfield. 
A  month  later  Douglas  replied  in  a  speech  at  Chicago.  Lincoln, 
who  was  present,  answered  Douglas  the  next  evening.  A  few 
days  later,  Douglas,  who  had  taken  the  stump,  replied  to  Lincoln 
at  Bloomington,  and  the  next  day  was  again  answered  by  Lin- 

1  The  Republican  state  convention  at  Springfield,  June  16,  1858,  "re 
solved,  that  Abraham  Lincoln  is  the  first  and  only  choice  of  the  Repub 
licans  of  Illinois  for  the  United  States  Senate  as  the  successor  of  Stephen 
A.  Douglas." 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL  359 

coin  at  Springfield.  The  deep  interest  aroused  by  this  running 
debate  led  the  Republican  managers  to  insist  that  Lincoln  should 
challenge  Douglas  to  a  series  of  joint  debates  in  public.  The 
challenge  was  sent  and  accepted,  and  debates  were  arranged 
for  at  seven  towns 1  named  by  Douglas.  The  questions  dis 
cussed  were  popular  sovereignty,  the  Dred  Scott  decision, 
the  extension  of  slavery  to  the  territories ;  and  the  discussion 
of  them  attracted  the  attention  of  the  whole  country.  Lincoln 
was  defeated  in  the  senatorial  election;  but  his  great  speeches 
won  for  him  a  national  reputation.2 

399.  John  Brown's  Raid  into  Virginia. —As  slavery  had 
become  the  great  political  issue  of  the  day,  it  is  not  surprising 
that  it  excited  a  lifelong  and  bitter  enemy  of  slavery  to  do 
a  foolish  act.  John  Brown  was  a  man  of  intense  convictions 
and  a  deep-seated  hatred  of  slavery.  When  the  border  ruf 
fianism  broke  out  in  Kansas  in  1855,  he  went  there  with  arms 
and  money,  and  soon  became  so  prominent  that  he  was  out 
lawed  and  a  price  set  on  his  head.  In  1858  he  left  Kansas, 
and  in  July,  1859,  settled  near  Harpers  Ferry,  Va.  (p.  360).  His 
purpose  was  to  stir  up  a  slave  insurrection  in  Virginia,  and  so 
secure  the  liberation  of  the  negroes.  With  this  in  view,  one 
Sunday  night  in  October,  1859,  he  with  less  than  twenty  fol 
lowers  seized  the  United  States  armory  at  Harpers  Ferry  and 
freed  as  many  slaves  and  arrested  as  many  whites  as  possible. 
But  no  insurrection  or  uprising  of  slaves  followed,  and  before  he 
could  escape  to  the  mountains  he  was  surrounded  and  captured 
by  Robert  E.  Lee,  then  a  colonel  in  the  army  of  the  United 
States.  Brown  was  tried  on  the  charges  of  murder  and  of 
treason  against  the  state  of  Virginia,  was  found  guilty,  and 
in  December,  1859,  was  hanged. 

1  One  in  each  Congressional  district  except  those  containing  Chicago 
and  Springfield,  where  both  Lincoln  and  Douglas  had  already  spoken. 
For  a  short  account  of  their  debates  see  the  Century  Magazine  for  Julv 
1887,  p.  386. 

2  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  308-389.    Nicolay 
and  Hay's  Life  of  Lincoln,  Vol.  II.,  Chaps.  10-16.    John  T.  Morse's  Life 
of  Lincoln,  Vol.  I.,  Chap.  (>. 


3GO 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


Harpers  Ferry 

400.  Split  in  the  Democratic  Party.  —  Thus  it  was  that  one 
event  after  another  prolonged  the  struggle  with  slavery  till 
1860,  when  the  people  were  once  more  to  elect  a  President. 

The  Democratic  nominating  convention  assembled  at  Charles 
ton,  S.C.,  in  April,  and  at  once  went  to  pieces.  A  strong  major 
ity  made  up  of  Northern  delegates  insisted  that  the  party  should 
declare  —  "  That  all  questions  in  regard  to  the  rights  of  property 
in  states  or  territories  arising  under  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States  are  judicial  in  their  character,  and  the  Demo 
cratic  party  is  pledged  to  abide  by  and  faithfully  carry  out 
such  determination  of  these  questions  as  has  been  or  may  be 
made  by  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States." 

This  meant  to  carry  out  the  doctrine  laid  down  in  the  Dred 
Scott  decision,  and  was  in  conflict  with  the  "popular  sover 
eignty  "  doctrine  of  Douglas,  which  was  that  the  right  of  the 
people  to  make  a  slave  territory  or  a  free  territory  is  perfect 


THE   TERRITORIES   BECOME    SLAVE   SOIL  361 

and  complete.     The  minority,  composed  of  the  extreme  South 
ern  men,  rejected  the  former  plan  and  insisted 

1.  "  That  the  Democracy  of  the  United  States  hold  these  car 

dinal  principles  on  the  subject  of  slavery  in  the  terri 
tories:  First,  that  Congress  has  no  power  to  abolish 
slavery  in  the  territories.  Second,  that  the  territorial 
legislature  has  no  power  to  abolish  slavery  in  any  terri 
tory,  nor  to  prohibit  the  introduction  of  slaves  therein, 
nor  any  power  to  exclude  slavery  therefrom,  nor  any 
right  to  destroy  or  impair  the  right  of  property  in 
slaves  by  any  legislation  whatever." 

2.  That  the  Federal   government  must   protect   slavery  "on 

the  high  seas,  in  the  territories,  and  wherever  else  its 
constitutional  authority  extends." 

Both  majority  and  minority  agreed  in  asserting 

1.  That  the  Personal  Liberty  laws  of  the  free  states  "are 

hostile  in  their  character,  subversive  of  the  Constitution, 
and  revolutionary  in  their  effect." 

2.  That  Cuba  ought  to  be  acquired  by  the  United  States. 

3.  That  a  railroad  ought  to  be  built  to  the  Pacific. 

Their  agreement  was  a  minor  matter.  Their  disagreement 
was  so  serious  that  when  the  minority  could  not  have  its 
way,  it  left  the  convention,  met  in  another  hall,  and  adopted 
its  resolutions. 

The  majority  of  the  convention  then  adjourned  to  meet  at 
Baltimore,  June  18,  1860.  As  it  was  then  apparent  that  Doug 
las  would  be  nominated,  another  split  occurred,  and  the  few 
Southern  men  attending,  together  with  some  Northern  dele 
gates,  withdrew.  Those  who  remained  nominated  Stephen  A. 
Douglas  and  Herschel  V.  Johnson. 

The  second  group  of  seceders  met  in  Baltimore,  adopted  the 
platform  of  the  first  group  of  seceders  from  the  Charleston 
convention,  and  nominated  John  C.  Breckinridge,  of  Ken 
tucky,  and  Joseph  Lane,  of  Oregon. 


THE   TERRITORIES  BECOME   SLAVE   SOIL  363 

401.  The  Constitutional  Union  Party Meanwhile   (May  9) 

another  party,  calling  itself  the  National  Constitutional  Union 
party,  met  at  Baltimore.     These  men  were  the  remnants  of  the 
old  Whig  and  American  or  Know-nothing  parties.    They  nomi 
nated  John  Bell,  of  Tennessee,  and  Edward  Everett,  of  Massa 
chusetts,  and  declared  for  "the  Constitution  of  the  country, 
the  union  of  the  states,  and  the  enforcement  of  the  laws." 

402.  Election  of  Lincoln. — The  Republican  party  met  in  con 
vention  at  Chicago  on  May  16,  and  nominated  Abraham  Lincoln, 
and  Hannibal  Hamliii  of  Maine.     It 

1.  Repudiated  the  principles  of  the  Dred  Scott  decision. 

2.  Demanded  the  admission  of  Kansas  as  a  free  state. 

3.  Denied  all  sympathy  with  any  kind  of  interference  with 

slavery  in  the  states. 

4.  Insisted  that  the  territories  must  be  kept  free. 

T>.    Called  for  a  railroad  to  the  Pacific,  and  a  homestead  law. 

The  election  took  place  in  November,  1860.  Of  303  elec 
toral  votes  cast,  Lincoln  received  180  ;  Breckinridge,  72 ;  Bell, 
39 ;  and  Douglas,  12. 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  Compromise  of  1850  did  not  settle  the  question  of  slavery  in  the 

territories,  and  an  attempt  to  organize  Kansas  and  Nebraska  brought 
it  up  again. 

2.  In   the   organization    of    these    territories   a   new   political   doctrine, 

"popular  sovereignty,"  was  announced. 

3.  This  was  applied  in  Kansas,  and  the  struggle  for  Kansas  began.     The 

first  territorial  government  was  proslavery.  The  antislavery  men 
then  made  a  constitution  (Topeka)  and  formed  a  free  state  govern 
ment.  Thereupon  the  proslavery  men  formed  a  constitution  (Le- 
compton)  for  a  slave  state.  This  was  submitted  to  Congress  and 
rejected,  and  Kansas  remained  a  territory  till  1861. 

4.  In  the  course  of  the  struggle  for  free  soil  in  Kansas  the  Whig  party 

went  to  pieces,  the  Democratic  was  split  into  two  wings,  and  the 
Know-nothing  or  Native  American  party  and  the  Republican  party 
arose. 

5.  The  Republican  party  was  defeated  in  1856,  but  the  Dred  Scott  de 

cision  in  1857  and  the  continued  struggle  in  Kansas  forced  the  ques 
tion  of  slavery  to  the  front,  and  in  18GO  Lincoln  was  elected. 


364 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY. 

I  ~~~ 

(THE  COMPROMISE  OF  1850. | 


Democratic  party.             The  Whigs. 

I 
Free-soil  party.                    Aim 

rican 
)lican, 

r  . 
ling  party. 

Pledged  tc 
,he  compr 
he      fugit 
aw.          £ 
Jierce     an 
852. 

support    Pledged   to   support 
)mise  and     the  compromise  and 
ive  -  slave    the       fugitive-slave 
fominates    law.            Nominate 
d     King.     Scott.    1852. 

Denounces  the 
promise     and 
fugitive  -slave 
Nominates  Hale 
Julian.     1852. 

uom- 

the    Know-not 
law 

and 

Pierce  elected,  1852. 

Kansas-Nebraska  law,  1854. 
Missouri    Compromise    re 
pealed.  —  Struggle  for  Kan 
sas.  —  Becomes  a  slave  ter 
ritory.  —The    Topeka   free 
state'  constitution. 

(  j  Break  up  old  parties,  1854. 

| 

i 
I 

{  Southern  l)emo-  1       |  Southern 
J      crats.                  l_l      Whigs. 
1  Northern  Demo-  (      j  Northern 
[     crats.                         [     Whigs. 
(  Anti-Nebraska     )  _  j  Anti-Nebraska 
)      Democrats.       \  ~  ~i      Whigs. 

1 

Fusion  tickets, 
1854. 

Democrats,  1856.              Whigs,  1S56. 

1 

Republican  partv, 
1854-1856. 

dominate  Buchanan     "Silver  Grays"  en- 
and  Breckinridge.         dorse  Fillmore  and 

Nominates  Fremont 
and  Dayton,  1856. 

Buchana 

18 

i  elected, 
56. 

1 

1856.  NOII 

i  nates  Fill- 
nd    Donel- 
tie  "  Silver 
endorse 
et, 

more    a 
son.     T 
Grays  ' 
the  tick 

Dred   Scott  decision.   1857. 
—  Lincoln-Douglas  debates, 
1858.  —Struggle  in  Kansas  : 
Lecompton  proslavery  con 
stitution    before   Congress. 
—  John  Brown  raid,  1859. 

1860. 

I 

Slavery  before  the  nomina 
ting  conventions.  1860. 

Democratic  party. 

Splits  on  the  question  of  slavery 
in  the  territories  into 


I860.  Nominates  Lin 
coln  and  Hamlin. 


State  rights.     Popular  sovereignty. 


1860.  Under  the  name 
of  Constitutional 
Union  party  nomi 
nates  Bell 
Everett. 


and 


Lincoln  elected. 


Breckinridge 
and  Lane. 


Secession. 


Douglas  and 
Johnson. 


Union. 


CHAPTER   XXVI 

PROGRESS  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  BETWEEN  1840  AND  1860 


Chicago  in  1832 

403.  The  Movement  of  Population.  — The  twenty  years  which 
elapsed  between  the  election  of  Harrison,  in  1840,  and  the 
election  of  Lincoln,  in  1860,  had  seen  a  most  astonishing 
change  in  our  country.  In  1840  neither  Texas,  nor  the 
immense  region  afterwards  acquired  from  Mexico,  belonged 
to  us.  There  were  then  but  twenty-six  states  and  five  terri 
tories,  inhabited  by  17,000,000  people,  of  whom  but  876,000 
lived  west  of  the  Mississippi  Eiver,  mostly  close  to  the  river 
bank  in  Missouri,  Arkansas,  and  Louisiana.  The  great  North 
west  was  still  a  wilderness,  and  many  a  city  now  familiar  to 
us  had  no  existence.  Toledo  and  Milwaukee  and  Indianap 
olis  had  each  less  than  3000  inhabitants;  Chicago  had  less 

365 


-366      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

than  5000;  and  Cleveland,  Columbus,  and  Detroit,  each  less 
than  10,000.  Yet  the  rapid  growth  of  cities  had  been  one  of 
the  characteristics  of  the  period  1830  to  1840. 

The  effect  of  new  mechanical  appliances  on  the  movement 
of  population  was  amazing.  The  day  when  emigrants  settled 
along  the  banks  of  streams,  pushed  their  boats  up  the  rivers  by 
means  of  poles,  carried  their  goods  on  the  backs  of  pack  horses, 
and  floated  their  produce  in  Kentucky  broadhorns  down  the 
Ohio  and  Mississippi  to  New  Orleans,  was  fast  disappearing. 
The  steamboat,  the  canal,  the  railroad,  had  opened  new  possi 
bilities.  Land  once  value-less  as  too  far  from  market  suddenly 
became  valuable.  Men  grew  loath  to  live  in  a  wilderness ;  the 
rush  of  emigrants  across  the  Mississippi  was  checked.  The 
region  between  the  Alleghanies  and  the  great  river  began  to 
fill  up  rapidly.  During  the  twenty  years,  1821  to  1841,  but 
two  states,  Arkansas  (1836)  and  Michigan  (1837),  were  ad 
mitted  to  the  Union,  and  but  three  new  territories,  Florida 
(1822-23),  Wisconsin  (1836),  and  Iowa  (1838),  were  established. 

So  few  people  went  west  from  the  Atlantic  seaboard  states 
that  in  each  one  of  them  except  Maine  and  Georgia  population 
increased  more  rapidly  than  it  had  ever  done  for  forty  years. 
From  the  Mississippi  valley  states,  however,  numbers  of  people 
went  to  Wi  scon  sin  and  Iowa. 

In  consequence  of  this,  Iowa  was  admitted  to  the  Union 
in  1846,  and  Wiscoijsin  in  1848.  Minnesota  and  Oregon  were 
made  territories.  Florida  and  Texas  had  been  admitted  in 
1845,  and  the  number  of  states  was  thus  raised  to  thirty  before 
1850.  The  population  of  the  country  in  1850  was  23,000,000. 
Two  states  in  the  Mississippi  valley  now  had  each  of  them 
more  than  a  million  of  inhabitants. 

404.  The  First  States  on  the  Pacific.  —  Until  1840  the  people 
had  moved  westward  steadily.  Each  state  as  it  was  settled 
had  touched  some  other  east,  or  north,  or  south  of  it.  After 
1840  people,  attracted  by  the  rich  fanning  land  and  pleasant 
climate  of  Oregon,  and  after  1848  by  the  gold  mines  of  Cali 
fornia,  rushed  across  the  plains  to  the  Pacific,  and  between 


ITI        SH  POSSESS 


Under  6  Inhabitants^ 
V  to  the  sq.  mile 

6  to  *5  Inhabitants   \ 
to 


DISTRIBUTION 

OF  THE 
1'01'ILATIOX  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

SEVENTH  CENSUS,  1850 


367 


\  ,368      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

1850  and  1860  built  up  the  states  of  California  and  Oregon 
(1859),  and  the  territory  of  Washington  (1853).  Minnesota 
was  admitted  in  1858.  The  population  of  the  United  States 
in  1860  was  31,000,000. 

405.  Immigration   to   the   United    States   since    1820.  —  The 
people  whose  movements  across  our  continent  we  have  been 
following  were  chiefly  natives  of  the  United  States.     But  we 
have  reached  the  time  when  foreigners  began  to  arrive  by 
hundreds  of  thousands  every  year.      From  the  close  of  the 
Revolution  to  1820,  it  is  thought  not  more  than  250,000  of  the 
Old  World  people  came  to  us.     But  the  hard  times  in  Europe, 
which  followed  the  disbanding  of  the  great  armies  which  had 
been  fighting  France  and  Napoleon  from  1789  to  1815,  started 
a  general  movement.     Beginning  at  10,000,  in  1820,  more  and 
more  came  every  year  till,  in   1842,  100,000  people  —  men, 
women,  and  children  —  landed  on  our  shore.     This  was  the 
greatest  number  that  had  ever  come  in  one  year.     But  it  was 
surpassed  in  1846,  when  the  potato  famine  in  Ireland,  and 
again  in  1853,  when  hard  times  in  Germany,  and  another  famine 
in  Ireland,  sent  over  two  immense  streams  of  emigrants.     In 
1854  no  less  than  428,000  persons  came  from  the  Old  World ; 
more  than  ever  came  again  in  one  year  till  1872. 

406.  Modern  Conveniences.  — When   we   compare   the  daily 
life  of  the  people  in  1850  with  that  of  the  men  of  1825,  the 
contrast  is  most  striking.     The  cities  had  increased  in  num 
ber,  grown  in  size,  and  greatly  changed  in  .appearance.     The 
older  ones  seemed  less  like  villages.     Their  streets  were  better 
paved  and  lighted.     Omnibuses  and  street  cars  were  becoming 
common.     The  constable  and  the  night  watch  had  given  way 
to  the  police  department.     Gas  and  plumbing  were  in  general 
use.      The  free  school  had  become  an  American  institution, 
and  many  of  the  numberless  inventions  and  discoveries  which 
have  done  so  much  to  increase  our  happiness,  prosperity,  and 
comfort,  existed  at  least  in  a  rude  form. 

Between  1840  and  1850  nearly  7000  miles  of  railroad  were 
built,  making  a  total  mileage  of  9000.     This  rapid  spread  of 


PROGRESS   BETWEEN   1840   AND   1860  369 

the  railroad,  when  joined  with  the  steamboats,  then  to  be 
found  on  every  river  and  lake  within  the  settled  area,  made 
possible  an  institution  which  to-day  renders  invaluable  service. 

407.  Express  Companies.  —  In   1839   a  young   man    named 
W.  F.  Harnden  began  to  carry  packages,  bundles,  money,  and 
small  boxes  between  New  York  and  Boston,  and  thus  started 
the  express  business.     At  first  he  carried  in  a  couple  of  carpet 
bags  all  the  packages  intrusted  to   him,  and  went  by  boat 
from  New   York  to  Stonington,  Conn.,  and  thence  by  rail  to 
Boston.     But  his  business  grew  so  rapidly  that  in  1840  a  rival 
express  was  started  by  P.  B.  Burke  and  Alvan  Adams.     Their 
route  was  from  Boston  to  Springfield,  Mass.,  and  thence  to  New 
York.    This  was  the  foundation  of  the  present  Adams  Express 
Company.     Both  companies  were  so  well  patronized  that  in 
1841  service  was  extended  to  Philadelphia  and  Albany,  and 
in  1844  to  Baltimore  and  Washington.     Their  example  was 
quickly  followed  by  a  host  of  imitators,  and  soon  a  dozen  ex 
press  companies  were  doing  business  between  the  grea*,  cities. 

408.  Postage  Stamps  introduced.  —  At  that  time  (1840)  three 
cents  was  the  postage  for  a  local  letter  which  was  not  deliv 
ered  by  a  carrier.      Indeed,  there  were  no  letter  carriers,  and 
this  in  large  cities  was  such  an  inconvenience  that  private 
dispatch  companies  undertook  to  deliver  letters  about  the  city 
for  two  cents  each ;  and  to  accommodate  their  customers  they 
issued  adhesive  stamps,  which,  placed  on  the  letters,  insured 
their    delivery.      The    loss    of    business    to    the    government 
caused  by   these  Companies,   and    the    general    demand    for 
quicker  and  cheaper  mail  service,  forced  Congress   to  revise 
the  postal  laws  in  1845,  when  an  attempt  was  made  to  intro 
duce  the  use  of  postage  stamps  by  the  government.     As  the 
mails  (in  consequence  of  the  growth  of  the  country  and  the 
easy   means   of   transportation)    were   becoming   very   heavy, 
the  postmasters  in  the  cities  and  important  towns  had  already 
begun  to  have  stamps  printed  at  their  own  cost.     Their  pur 
pose  was  to  save  time,  for  letter  postage  was  frequently  (but 
not  always)  prepaid.     But  instead  of  fixing  a  stamp  on  the 


370 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


POST  OITICE 


St.  Louis  postage 
stamp 


envelope  (there  was  no  such  thing  in  1840),  the  writer  sent 
the  letter  to  the  post  office  and  paid  the  postage  in  money, 
whereupon  the  postmaster  stamped  the  letter  "Paid."  This 
consumed  the  time  of  the  postmaster  and  the  letter  writer. 
But  when  he  could  go  once  to  the  post  office  and  prepay  a 
hundred  letters  by  buying  a  hundred  stamps,  any  one  of  which 
affixed  to  a  letter  was  evidence  that  its  postage 
had  been  paid,  any  man  who  wanted  to  could 
save  his  time.  These  stamps  the  postmasters 
sold  at  a  little  more  than  the  expense  of  print 
ing.  Thus  the  postmasters  of  New  York  and 
St.  Louis  charged  one  dollar  for  nine  ten-cent 
or  eighteen  five-cent  stamps.  This  increased 
the  price  of  postage  a  trifle ;  but  as  the  use  of 
the  stamps  was  optional,  the  burden  fell  on 
those  willing  to  bear  it,  while  the  convenience 
was  so  great  that  the  effort  made  to  have  the  Post-office  De 
partment  furnish  the  stamps  and  require  the  people  to  use 
them  succeeded  in  1847. 

409.  Mechanical  Improvements.  — No  American  need  be  told 
that  his  fellow-countrymen  are  the  most  ingenious  people  the 
world  has  ever  known.  But  we  do  not  always  remember  that 
it  was  during  this  period  (1840-1860)  that  the  marvelous 
inventive  genius  of  the  people  of  the  United  States  began  to 
show  itself.  Between  the  day  when  the  patent  office  was 
established,  in  1790,  and  1840,  the  number  of  patents  issued 
was  11,908 ;  but  after  1840  the  stream  poured  forth  increased 
in  volume  nearly  every  year.  In  1855  there  were  2012  issued 
and  reissued;  in  1856,  2506;  in  1857,  2896;  in  1858,  3695; 
and  in  1860,  4778,  raising  the  total  number  to  43,431.  An 
examination  of  these  inventions  shows  that  they  related  to 
cotton  gins  and  cotton  presses;  to  reapers  and  mowers;  to 
steam  engines ;  to  railroads ;  to  looms ;  to  cooking  stoves ;  to 
sewing  machines,  printing  presses,  boot  and  shoe  machines, 
rubber  goods,  floor  cloths,  and  a  hundred  other  things.  Very 
many  of  them  helped  to  increase  the  comfort  of  man  and  raise 


PROGRESS    BETWEEN    1840   AND    1860 


371 


The  first  Howe  sewing  machine 


the  standard  of  living.  Three  of  them,  however,  have  revolu 
tionized  the  industrial  and  business  world  and  been  of  inesti 
mable  good  to  mankind.  They  are  the  sewing  machine, 
the  reaper  X^^  and  the  electric  telegraph. 

410.  The  Sewing  Machine.  —  As  far  back 
as  the  year  1834,  Walter 
Hunt  made  and  sold  a  few 
sewing  machines  in  New 
York.  But  the  man  to 
whose  genius,  perseverance, 
and  unflinching  zeal  the 
world  owes  the  sewing  ma 
chine,  is  Elias  Howe.  His 
patent  was  obtained  in  1846, 
and  he  then  spent  four  years 
in  poverty  and  distress  try 
ing  to  convince  the  world  of 
the  utility  of  his  machine. 
By  1850  he  succeeded  not  only  in  interesting  the  public,  but 
in  so  arousing  the  mechanical  world  that  seven  rivals  (Wheeler 
and  Wilson,  Grover  and  Baker,  Wilcox  and  Gibbs,  and  Singer) 
entered  the  field.  To  the  combined  efforts  of  them  all,  we  owe 
one  of  the  most  useful  inventions  of  the  century.  It  has 
lessened  the  cost  of  every  kind  of  cloth 
ing  ;  of  shoes  and  boots ;  of  harness ; 
of  everything,  in  short,  that 
can  be  sewed.  It  has  given 
employment  to  millions  of 
people,  and  has  greatly 
added  to  the  comfort  of 
every  household  in  the  civil 
ized  world. 

411.     The    Harvester.  — 
Much  the  same  can  be  said 
of  the  McCormick  reaper.     It  was  invented  and  patented  as 
early  as  1831 ;  but  it  was  hard  work  to  persuade  the  farmer  to 


The  Wilson  sewing  machine  of  1850 


372  THE  LONG  STRUGGLE   WITH  SLAVERY 

use  it.  Not  a  machine  was  sold  till  1841.  During  1841, 1842, 
1843,  such  as  were  made  in  the  little  blacksmith  shop  near 
Steel's  Tavern,  Virginia,  were  disposed  of  with  difficulty. 
Every  effort  to  induce  manufacturers  to  make  the  machine  was 
a  failure.  Not  till  McCormick  had  gone  on  horseback  among 
the  farmers  of  Kentucky,  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illinois,  and  se 
cured  written  orders  for  his  reapers,  did  he  persuade  a  firm  in 
Cincinnati  to  make  them.  In  1845,  five  hundred  were  manu 
factured  ;  in  1850,  three  thousand.  In  1851  McCormick  placed 
one  on  exhibition  at  the  World's  Fair  in  London,  and  aston 
ished  the  world  with  its  performance.  To-day  two  hundred 
thousand  are  turned  out  annually,  and  without  them  the  great 
grain  fields  of  the  middle  West  and  the  far  West  would  be 
impossible.  The  harvester  has  cheapened  the  cost  of  bread, 
and  benefited  the  whole  human  race. 

412.  The  Telegraph.  — Think,  again,  what  would  be  our  condi 
tion  if  every  telegraph  line  in  the  world  were  suddenly  pulled 
down.  Yet  the  telegraph,  like  the  reaper  and  the  sewing 
machine,  was  introduced  slowly.  Samuel  F.  B.  Morse  got  his 
patent  in  1837 ;  and  for  seven  years,  helped  by  Alfred  Vail,  he 
struggled  on  against  poverty.  In  1842  he  had  but  thirty-seven 
cents  in  the  world.  But  perseverance  conquers  all  things ;  and 
with  thirty  thousand  dollars,  granted  by  Congress,  the  first 
telegraph  line  in  the  world  was  built  in  1844  from  Baltimore 
to  Washington.  In  1845  New  York  and  Philadelphia  were 
connected;  but  as  wires  could  not  be  made  to  work  under 
water,  the  messages  were  received  on  the  New  Jersey  side  of 
the  Hudson  and  carried  to  New  York  by  boat.  By  1856  the 
telegraph  was  in  use  in  the  most  populous  states.  Some  forty 
companies,  but  one  of  which  paid  dividends,  competed  for  the 
business.  This  was  ruinous ;  and  in  1856  a  union  of  Western 
companies  was  formed  and  called  the  Western  Union  Tele 
graph  Company.  To-day  it  has  21,000  offices,  sends  each  year 
some  58,000,000  messages,  receives  about  $23,000,000,  and 
does  seven  eighths  of  all  the  telegraph  business  in  the  United 
States. 


PROGRESS    BETWEEN    1840    AND    1860  373 

413.  India  Rubber.  —  The  same  year  (1844)  which  witnessed 
the  introduction  of  the  telegraph  saw  the  perfection  of  Good- 
year's  secret  for  the  vulcanization  of  India  rubber.     In  1820 
the  first  pair  of  rubber  shoes  ever  seen  in  the  United  States 
were  exhibited  in  Boston.     Two  years  later  a  ship  from  South 
America  brought  500  pairs  of  rubber  shoes.     They  were  thick, 
heavy,  and  ill-shaped;    but   they  sold   so   rapidly  that   more 
were  imported,  and  in  1830  a  cargo  of  raw  gum  was  brought 
from  South  America  for  the  purpose  of  making  rubber  goods. 
With  this  C.  M.  Chaffee  went  to  work  and  succeeded  in  pro 
ducing  some  pieces  of  cloth  spread  with  rubber.     Supposing 
the  invention  to  be  of  great  value,  a  number  of  factories l  began 
to  make  rubber  coats,  caps,  wagon  curtains,  of  pure  rubber 
without  cloth.     But  to  the  horror  of  the  companies  the  goods 
melted  when  hot  weather  came,  and  were  sent  back,  emitting  so 
dreadful  an  odor  that  they  had  to  be  buried.     It  was  to  over 
come  this  and  find  some  means  of  hardening  the  gum  that 
Goodyear  began  his  experiments  and  labored  year  after  year 
against  every  sort  of  discouragement.     Even  when  the  secret 
of  vulcanizing,  as  it  is  called,  was  discovered,  five  years  passed 
before  he  was  able  to  conduct  the  process  with  absolute  cer 
tainty.     In  1844,  after  ten  years  of  labor,  he  succeeded  and 
gave  to  the  world  one  of  the  most  useful  inventions  of  the 
nineteenth  century. 

414.  The    Photograph ;    the  Discovery  of  Anaesthesia.  —  But 
there  were  other  inventions  and  discoveries  of  almost  as  great 
or  even  greater  value  to  mankind.     In  1840  Dr.  John  W.  Draper 
so  perfected  the  daguerreotype  that  it  could  be  used  to  take  pic 
tures  of  persons  and  landscapes.     Till  then  it  could -be  used 
only  to  make  pictures  of  buildings  and  statuary. 

The  year  1846  is  made  yet  more  memorable  by  the  discovery 
that  whoever  inhaled  sulphuric  ether  would  become  insensible 
to  pain.  The  glory  of  this  discovery  has  been  claimed  for 
two  men :  Dr.  Morton  and  Dr.  Jackson.  Which  one  is  entitled 

1  At  Roxbury,  Boston,  Framingham,  Salem,  Lynn,  Chelsea,  Troy,  and 
Staten  Island. 

McM.  HIST. —  21 


374  THE   LONG  STRUGGLE   WITH   SLAVERY 

to  it  cannot  be  positively  decided,  though  Dr.  Morton  seems  to 
have  the  better  right  to  be  considered  the  discoverer.  Before 
this,  however,  anaesthesia  by  nitrous  oxide  (laughing  gas)  had 
been  discovered  by  Dr.  Wells  of  Hartford,  Conn.,  and  by  Dr. 
Long  of  Georgia. 

415.  Communication    with   Europe;     Steamships.  —  Progress 
was  not  confined  to  affairs  within  our  boundary.     Communi 
cations  with  Europe  were   greatly  advanced.      The    passage 
of   the   steamship  Savannah  across   the   Atlantic,  partly   by 
steam  and  partly  by  sail,  in  1819,  resulted  in  nothing  practi 
cal.     The  wood  used  for  fuel  left  little  space  for  freight.     But 
when  better  machinery  reduced  the  time,  and  coal  afforded  a 
less  bulky  fuel,  the  passage  across  the  Atlantic  by  steam  became 
possible,  and  in  1837  two  vessels,  the  Sinus  and  the  Great 
Western,  made  the  trip  from  Liverpool  to  New  York  by  steam 
alone.     No  sails  were  used.     This  showed  what  could  be  done, 
and  in  1839  Samuel  Cunard  began  the  great  fleet  of  Atlantic 
greyhounds   by   founding  the  Cunard  Line.       Aided  by  the 
British  government,  he  drove  all  competitors  from  the  field, 
till  Congress  came  to  the  aid  of  the  Collins  Line,  whose  steam 
ers  made  the  first  trip  from  New  York  to  Liverpool  in  1850. 
The  rivalry  between  these  lines  was  intense,  and  each  did  its 
best  to  make  short  voyages.     In  1851  the  average  time  from 
Liverpool  to  New  York  was  eleven  days,  eight  hours,  for  the 
Collins   Line,  and   eleven   days,  twenty-three  hours,  for  the 
Cunard.     This  was  considered  astonishing;  for  Liverpool  and 
New  York  were  thus  brought  as  near  each  other  in  point  of 
time  in  1851  as  Boston  and  Philadelphia  were  in  1790. 

416.  The  Atlantic  Cable.  —  But  something  more  astonishing 
yet  was  at  hand.     In  1854  Mr.  Cyrus  W.  Field  of  New  York 
was  asked    to  aid  in  the  construction  of   a  submarine  cable 
to  join   St.   Johns   with   Cape   Kay,  Newfoundland.      While 
considering  the  matter,  he  became  convinced  that  if  a  cable 
could  be  laid  across  the  Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence,  another  could 
be  laid  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  and  he  formed  the  "New 
York,  Newfoundland,  and  London  Telegraph  Company"  for 


PROGRESS  BETWEEN   1840  AND  1860 


.  -^x-. 

the  purpose  of  doing  sol  "T^^first  attempt,  made  in 
and  a  second  in  1858,  endea  in  failure  ;  but  a  third,  in  1858, 
was  successful,  and  a  cable  was  laid  from  Valentia  Bay  in 
Ireland  to  Trinity  Bay  in  Newfoundland,  a  distance  of  1700 
geographical  miles.  For  three  weeks  all  went  well,  and  during 
this  time  400  messages  were  sent  ;  but  on  September  1,  1858, 
the  cable  ceased  to  work,  and  eight  years  passed  before  another 
attempt  was  made  to  join  the  Old  World  and  the  New. 

417.  Condition  of  the  Workingman.  —  Every  class  of  society 
was  benefited  by  these  improvements,  but  no  man  more  so 
than  those  who  depended  on  their  daily  wages  for  their  daily 
bread.  Though  wages  increased  but  little,  they  were  more 
easily  earned  and  brought  richer  returns.  Improved  means 
of  transportation,  cheaper  methods  of  manufacture,  enabled 
every  laborer  in  1860  to  wear  better  clothes  and  eat  better 
food  than  had  been  worn  or  consumed  by  his  father  in  1830. 
New  industries,  new  trades  and  occupations,  new  needs  in  the 
business  world,  afforded  to  his  son  and  daughter  opportuni 
ties  for  a  livelihood  unknown  in  his  youth,  while  the  free 
school  system  enabled  them  to  fit  themselves  to  use  such  op 
portunities  without  cost  to  him.  When  our  country  became 
independent,  and  for  fifty  years  afterwards,  a  working  day  was 
from  sunrise  to  sunset,  with  an  hour  for  breakfast  and  another 
for  dinner.  After  manufactures  arose,  and  mills  and  factories 
gave  employment  to  thousands  of  wage  earners,  fourteen,  fifteen, 
and  even  sixteen  hours  of  labor  were  counted  a  day.  Protests 
were  early  made  against  this,  and  demands  raised  that  a  work 
ing  day  should  be  ten  hours.  At  last,  late  in  the  thirties,  the 
ten  hours  system  was  adopted  in  Baltimore,  and  in  1840,  by 
order  of  President  Van  Buren,  was  put  in  force  at  the  navy 
yard  in  Washington  and  in  "all  public  establishments"  under 
the  Federal  government.  Thus  established,  the  system  spread 
slowly,  till  to-day  it  exists  almost  everywhere.  Indeed,  in 
many  states,  and  in  all  departments  of  the  Federal  govern 
ment,  eight  hours  of  work  constitute  a  day.  Thus,  by  the  aid 
of  machinery,  not  only  are  articles,  formerly  expensive,  made 


376      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

so  cheaply  that  poor  men  can  afford  to  use  them,  but  the  wage 
earners  who  operate  the  machinery  can  make  these  articles  so 
quickly  that  they  to-day  earn  higher  wages  for  fewer  hours 
of  work  than  ever  before  in  the  history  of  the  world.  Not 
only  did  wages  increase  and  the  hours  of  labor  grow  shorter 
between  1840  and  1860,  but  the  field  of  labor  was  enormously 
expanded.  In  1810,  when  the  first  census  of  manufactures  in 
the  United  States  was  taken,  the  value  of  goods  manufactured 
was  $173,000,000.  In  1860  it  was  ten  times  as  great,  and 
gave  employment  to  more  than  1,000,000  men  and  women. 

418.  Few  Manufactures  in  the  Slave  States.  —  From  much  of 
the  benefit  produced  by  this  splendid  series  of  inventions  and 
discoveries,  the  people  of  the  slave-owning  states  were  shut 
out.  They  raised  corn,  tobacco,  and  cotton,  and  made  some 
sugar ;  but  in  them  there  were  very  few  mills  or  manufacturing 
establishments  of  any  sort.  While  a  great  social  and  indus 
trial  revolution  was  going  on  in  the  free  states,  the  people  in 
the  slave  states  remained  in  1860  what  they  were  in  1800. 
The  stream  of  immigrants  from  Europe  passed  the  slave  states 
by,  carrying  their  skill,  their  thrift,  their  energy,  into  the 
Northwest.  The  resources  of  the  slave  states  were  boundless, 
but  no  free  man  would  go  in  to  develop  them.  The  soil  was 
fertile,  but  no  free  laborer  could  live  on  it  and  compete  with 
slave  labor,  on  which  all  agriculture,  all  industry,  all  pros 
perity,  in  the  South  depended.  The  two  sections  of  the  coun 
try  at  the  end  of  the  period  1840-1860  were  thus  more  unlike 
than  ever. 

SUMMARY 

1.  Between  1830  and  1850  the  rush  of  population  into  the  West  con 

tinued,  but,  instead  of  moving  across  the  continent,  most  of  the 
people  settled  in  the  states  already  in  existence. 

2.  This  was  due  to  the  effect  of  such  improved  means  of  communication 

as  steamboats,  railroads,  canals,  etc. 

3.  As  a  consequence,  but  six  new  states  were  admitted  to  the  Union  in 

twenty-nine  years,  and  one  of  them  was  annexed  (Texas). 

4.  The  period  is  also  noticeable  for  the  number  of  foreigners  who  came 

to  our  shores. 


PROGRESS   BETWEEN   1840   AND   1860 


377 


5.  After  1849  the  existence  of  gold  in  California  brought  so  many  people 

to  the  Pacific  coast  that  California  became  a  state  in  1850. 

6.  As  population  grew  denser,  and  transportation  was  facilitated  by  the 

expansion  of  railroads  and  steamboats  and  canals,  business  oppor 
tunities  were  increased,  and  new  markets  were  created. 

7.  Labor-saving  and  time-saving  machines  and  appliances  became  more 

in  demand  than  ever,  and  a  long  list  of  remarkable  inventions  and 
business  aids  appeared. 

8.  The  South,  owing  to  its  own  peculiar  industrial  and  labor  condition, 

was  little  benefited  by  all  these  improvements,  and  remained  much 
the  same  as  in  1800. 


Immigration  .  . 

No.  of  people  in 
U.S.  . 


Movement 
I      westward 


Causes. 

Number  of  immigrants. 
f  1840.     17,000,000. 
•!  1850.     23,000,000. 
I  1800.     31,000,000. 

Arkansas,  1836. 
Michigan,  1837. 
Florida,  1845. 
i  Texas,  1845. 
New  states   .  .  •!  Iowa,  1846. 

Wisconsin,  1848. 
California,  1850. 
Minnesota,  1858. 
Oregon,  1859. 
New  Mexico,  1850. 
Utah,  1850. 
Washington,  1853. 
Kansas,  1854. 
Nebraska,  1854. 


Slave. 

Free. 

Slave. 

Slave. 

Free. 

Free. 

Free. 

Free. 

Free. 


Territories 


Gas. 

Plumbing. 

Paved  streets. 

General  use  of  anthracite. 

Free  schools. 

Railroad  expansion. 

Express. 

Postage  stamps. 

Ocean  steamships. 


f  Number  of  patents. 

The  sewing  machine. 

The  harvester. 

The  telegraph. 

India  rubber. 

Daguerreotype. 

Anaesthesia. 
I  Atlantic  cable. 


The  South  . 


Little  affected  by  new  industrial  conditions. 
Few  manufactures. 
Increase  of  the  cotton  area. 
No  immigration. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

WAR  FOR   THE   UNION,    1861-1865 

419.  South  Carolina  secedes.  —  The  only  state  where  in  1860 
presidential  electors  were  chosen  by  the  legislature  was  South 
Carolina.     When  the  legislature  met  for  this  purpose,  Novem 
ber  6,   1860,  the   governor   asked   it  not  to  adjourn,  but  to 
remain  in  session  till  the  result  of  the  election  was  known. 
If  Lincoln  is  elected,  said  he,  the  "  secession  of  South  Carolina 
from  the  Union  "  will  be  necessary.     Lincoln  was  elected,  and 
on  December  20,  1860,   a  convention  of  delegates,  called  by 
the  legislature  to  consider  the  question  of  secession,  formally 
declared  that  South  Carolina  was  no  longer  one  of  the  United 
States.1 

420.  The  ' '  Confederate  States  of  America. "  —  The  meaning  of 
this  act  of  secession  was  that  South  Carolina  now  claimed  to 
be  a  "  sovereign,  free,  and  independent "  nation.     But  she  was 
not  the  only  state  to  take  this  step.    By  February  1, 1861,  Mis 
sissippi,  Florida,  Alabama,  Georgia,  Louisiana,  and  Texas  had 
also  left  the  Union.     Three  days  later,  February  4,  1861,  dele 
gates  from  six  of  these  seven  states  met  at  Montgomery,  Ala., 
formed  a  constitution,  established  a  provisional  government, 
which  they  called  the  "Confederate  States  of  America,"  and 
elected  Jefferson    Davis  and  Alexander  H.  Stephens  provi 
sional  President  and  Vice  President. 

Toward  preventing  or  stopping  this,  Buchanan  did  nothing. 

1  "  We  the  people  of  the  state  of  South  Carolina,  in  convention  assem 
bled,  do  declare  and  ordain  .  .  .  that  the  union  now  subsisting  between 
South  Carolina  and  other  states,  under  the  nalne  of  the  United  States  of 
America,  is  hereby  dissolved." 

378 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,    1861-1865 


379 


CHARLESTON  HARBOR 

AND  APPROACHES 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


No  state,  he  said,  had  a  right  to  secede.  But  a  state  having 
seceded,  he  had  no  power  to  make  her  come  back,  because  he 
could  not  make  war  on  a  state ;  that  is,  he  could  not  preserve 
the  Union.  On  one  matter,  however,  he  was  forced  to  act. 
When  South  Carolina  seceded,  the  three  forts  in  Charleston 
harbor  —  Castle  Pinckney,  Fort  Sumter,  and  Fort  Moultrie  — 
were  in  charge  of  a  major  of  artillery  named  Robert  Ander 
son.  He  had  under  him  some 
eighty  officers  and  men,  and 
knowing  that  he  could  not 
hold  all  three  forts,  and  fear 
ing  that  the  South  would  seize 
Fort  Sumter,  he  dismantled 
Fort  Moultrie,  spiked  the 
cannon,  cut  down  the  flag 
staff,  and  removed  to  Fort 
Sumter,  on  the  evening  of 
December  26,  1860. 

This  act  was  heartily  ap 
proved  by  the  people  of  the 
North  and  by  Congress,  and 
Buchanan  with  great  reluc 
tance  yielded  to  their  de 
mand,  and  sent  the  Star  of 
the  West,  with  food  and  men, 
to  relieve  Anderson.  But  as 
the  vessel,  with  our  flag  at 
its  fore,  was  steaming  up  the  channel  toward  Charleston  har 
bor,  the  Southern  batteries  fired  upon  her,  and  she  went 
back  to  New  York.  Anderson  was  thus  left  to  his  fate,  and 
as  Buchanan's  term  was  nearly  out,  both  sides  waited  to  see 
what  Lincoln  would  do. 

421.  Why  did  the  States  secede?  — Why  did  the  Southern 
slave  states  secede?  To  be  fair  to  them  we  must  seek  the 
answer  in  the  speeches  of  their  leaders.  "  Your  votes,"  said 
Jefferson  Davis,  "  refuse  to  recognize  our  domestic  institutions. 


380  THE   LONG   STRUGGLE   WITH   SLAVERY 

[slavery],  which  preexisted  the  formation  of  the  Union,  our 
property  [slaves],  which  was  guaranteed  by  the  Constitution. 
You  refuse  us  that  equality  without  which  we  should  be  de 
graded  if  we  remained  in  the  Union.  You  elect  a  candidate 
upon  the  basis  of  sectional  hostility ;  one  who  in  his  speeches, 
now  thrown  broadcast  over  the  country,  made  a  distinct  decla 
ration  of  war  upon  our  institutions." 

"  There  is,"  said  Howell  Cobb,  of  Georgia,  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  of  the  United  States,  "  no  other  remedy  for  the  ex 
isting  state  of  things  except  immediate  secession." 

"Our  position,"  said  the  Mississippi  secession  convention, 
"  is  thoroughly  identified  with  the  institution  of  slavery.  A 
blow  at  slavery  is  a  blow  at  commerce  and  civilization.  There 
was  no  choice  left  us  but  submission  to  the  mandates  of  aboli 
tion,  or  a  dissolution  of  the  Union." 

Alexander  H.  Stephens,  the  Vice  President  of  the  Confed 
eracy,  asserted  that  the  Personal  Liberty  laws  of  some  of  the 
free  states  "constitute  the  only  cause,  in  my  opinion,  which 
can  justify  secession." 

The  South  seceded,  then,  according  to  its  own  statements, 
because  the  people  believed  that  the  election  of  Lincoln  meant 
the  abolition  of  slavery. 

422.  Compromise  attempted.  —  The  Republican  party  in  1861 
had  no  intention  of  abolishing  slavery.  Its  purpose  was  to 
stop  the  spread  of  slavery  into  the  territories,  to  stop  the  ad 
mission  of  more  slave  states,  but  not  to  abolish  slavery  in 
states  where  it  already  existed.  A  strong  wish  therefore 
existed  in  the  North  to  compromise  the  sectional  differences. 
Many  plans  for  a  compromise  were  offered,  but  only  one,  that 
of  Crittendcn,  of  Kentucky,  need  be  mentioned.  He  proposed 
that  the  Constitution  should  be  so  amended  as  to  provide 

1.  That  all  territory  of  the  United  States  north  of  36°  30' 

should  be  free,  and  all  south  of  it  slave  soil. 

2.  That  slaves  should  be  protected  as  property  by  all  the  de 

partments  of  the  territorial  government. 


/  0  (r    '  /Igf     (-^-^-^r 

WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,    1861-1865  381 

3.  That  states  should  be  admitted  with  or  without  slavery  as 

their   constitutions   provided,   whether   the  states    were 
north  or  south  of  36°  30'. 

4.  That  Congress  should  have  no  power  to  shut  slavery  out 

of  the  territories. 

5.  That  the  United  States  should  pay  owners  for  rescued  fugi 

tive  slaves. 

As  these  propositions  recognized  the  right  of  property  in 
slaves,  that  is,  put  the  black  man  on  a  level  with  horses  and 
cattle,  the  Republicans  rejected  them,  and  the  attempt  to  com 
promise  ended  in  failure. 

423.  A  Proposed  Thirteenth  Amendment.  —  One  act  of  great 
significance  was  done.  A  proposition  to  add  a  thirteenth  amend 
ment  to  the  Constitution  was  submitted  to  the  states.  It  read, 

"No  amendment  shall  be  made  to  the  Constitution  which 
will  authorize  or  give  to  Congress  the  power  to  abolish  or 
interfere  within  any  state  with  the  domestic  institutions 
thereof,  including  that  of  persons  held  to  labor  or  service  by 
the  laws  of  said  states." 

Even  Lincoln  approved  of  this,  and  two  states,  Maryland 
and  Ohio,  accepted  it.  But  the  issue  was  at  hand.  It  was  too 
late  to  compronijj 

>raham  Lincoln,  Sixteenth  President.  —  Lincoln  and 
Hamlin  were  inaugurated  on  March  4,  1861,  and  in  his  speech 
from  the  Capitol  steps  Lincoln  was  very  careful  to  state  just 
what  he  wanted  to  do. 

1.  "I  have  no  purpose,"  said  he,  "directly  or  indirectly,  to 

interfere   with  the   institution  of  slavery  in  the  states 
where  it  exists." 

2.  "  I  consider  the  Union  is  unbroken,  and  to  the  extent  of 

my  ability  I  shall  take  care  .  .  .  that  the  laws  of  the 
Union  be  faithfully  executed  in  all  the  states." 

3.  "In  doing  this  there  need  be  no  bloodshed  or  violence; 

and  there  shall  be  none,  unless  it  be  forced  upon  the 
national  authority." 


382  THE  LONG  STRUGGLE   WITH  SLAVERY 

4.  "  The  power  confided  in  me  will  be  used  to  hold,  occupy, 
and  possess  the  property  and  places  belonging  to  the 
government  and  to  collect  the  duties  and  imposts." 

425.  Civil  War  begins.  —  One  of  the  places  Lincoln  thus 
pledged  himself  to  "hold"  was  Fort  Sumter,  to  which  he 
decided  to  send  men  and  supplies.  As  soon  as  notice  of 
this  intention  was  sent  to  Governor  Pickens  of  South  Caro 
lina,  the  Confederate  commander  at  Charleston,  General  Beau- 
regard  (bo-ruh-gar'),  demanded  the  surrender  of  the  fort. 
Major  Anderson  stoutly  refused  to  comply  with  the  demand, 
and  at  dawn  on -the  morning  of  April  12,  1861,  the  Confeder- 


Fort  Sumter 

ates  fired  the  first  gun  at  Surnter.  During  the  next  thirty- 
four  hours,  nineteen  batteries  poured  shot  and  shell  into  the 
fort,  which  steadily  returned  the  fire,  "Then  both  food  and 
powder  were  nearly  exhausted,  and  part  of  the  fort  being 
on  fire,  Anderson  surrendered;  and  on  Sunday,  April  14, 
1861,  he  marched  out,  taking  with  him  the  tattered  flag 
under  which  he  made  so  gallant  a  fight.1  The  fleet  sent  to 

1  "  Having  defended  Fort  Sumter  for  thirty-four  hours,  until  the 
quarters  were  entirely  burned,  the  main  gates  destroyed  by  fire,  the  gorge 
walls  seriously  injured,  the  magazine  surrounded  by  flames,  and  its  door 
closed  from  the  effect  of  heat,  four  barrels  and  three  cartridges  of  powder 
being  available,  and  no  provisions  remaining  but  pork,  I  accepted  terms  of 
evacuation  offered  by  General  Beauregard  .  .  .  and  marched  out  of  the 
fort  on  Sunday  afternoon,  the  14th  instant,  with  colors  flying  and  drums 
beating  .  .  .  and  saluting  my  flag  with  fifty  guns."  — Major  Anderson  to 
the  Secretary  of  War, 


WAR   FOR   THE   UNION,    1861-1865  383 

his  aid  arrived  in  time  to  see  the  battle,  but  did  not  give  him 
any  help.  After  the  surrender,  one  of  the  ships  carried 
Anderson  and  the  garrison  to  New  York.1 

426.  The  Life  of  the  Republic  at  Stake.  —  Thus  was  begun 
the  greatest  war  in  modern  history.  It  was  no  vulgar  struggle 
for  territory,  or  for  maritime  or  military  supremacy.  The 
life  of  the  Union  was  at  stake.  The  questions  to  be  decided 
were:  Shall  there  be  one  or  two  republics  on  the  soil  of  the 
United  States  ?  Shall  the  great  principle  of  all  democratic- 
republican  government,  the  principle  that  the  will  of  the 
majority  shall  rule,  be  maintained  or  abandoned?  Shall  state 
sovereignty  be  recognized  ?  Shall  states  Be  suffered  to  leave 
the  Union  at  will,  or  shall  the  United  States  continue  to  exist 
as  "  an  indestructible  Union  of  indestructible  States "  ?  As 
Mr.  Lincoln  said,  "Both  parties  deprecated  war;  but  one  of 
them  would  make  war  rather  than  let  the  nation  survive ;  and 
the  other  would  accept  war  rather  than  let  it  perish." 

427.  The  South   better   prepared.  —  For  the  struggle  which 
was  to  decide  these  questions  neither  side  was  ready,  but  the 
•South  was  better  prepared  than  the  North.      The  South  was 
united  as  one  man.    The  North  was  divided  and  full  of  South 
ern  sympathizers.     She  knew  not  whom  to  trust.     Officers  of 
the  army,  officers  of  the  navy,  were  resigning  every  day.     The 
great  departments   of    government  at  Washington  contained 
many  men  who  furnished  information  to   Southern  officials. 
Seventeen  steam  war  vessels  (two  thirds  of  all  that  were  not 
laid  up  or  unfit  for  service)   were  in  foreign  parts.     Large 
quantities  of  military  supplies  had  been  stor.ed  in  Southern 
forts.     All   the   great   powers   of   Europe    save   Kussia   were 
hostile  to  our  republic,  and  would  gladly  have  seen  it  rent  in 
twain.     The  South,  again,  had  the  advantage  in  that  she  was 
to  act  on  the  defensive. 

428.  Results  of  firing  on  the  Flag.  —  Not  a  man  was  killed 
on  either  side  during  the  bombardment  of  Sumter.     Yet  the 
battle  was  a  famous  one,  and  led  to  greater  consequences : 

1  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  60-73. 


THE  UNITED  STATES 
July  1861 

SHOWING  THE  GREATEST  EXTENSION 
OF  THE 

Southern  Confederacy 


385 


386 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


1.    Lincoln  at  once  called  for  75,000  militia  to  serve  for  three 

months. 

Four  "  border  states,"  as  they  were  called,  thus  forced  to 
choose  their  side,  seceded.  They  were  Arkansas,  North 
Carolina,  Virginia,  and  Tennessee. 

3.  The  Congress  of  the  United  States  was  called  to  meet  at 

Washington,  July  4,  1861. 

4.  After  Virginia  seceded,  the  capital  of  the  Confederacy,  at 

the  invitation  of  the  Virginia  secession  convention,  was 
moved  from  Montgomery  to  Richmond,  and  the  Confed- 
V     erate  Congress  adjourned  to  meet  there  July  20,  1861. 


West  Virginia.  —  The  act  of  secession  by  Virginia  was 
promptly  repudiated  by  the  people  of  the  counties  west  of  the 
mountains,  who  refused  to  secede,  and  voted  to  form  a  new 
state  under  the  name  of  Kanawha.  They  adopted  a  constitu 
tion  and  were  finally  admitted  in  1863  as  the  state  of  West 
Virginia.1 

430.  The  Call  to  Arms.  —  Lincoln  held  that  no  state  could 
ever  leave  the  Union,  and  that  therefore  no  state  had  left 
the  Union.  Those  which  had  passed  ordinances  of  seces 
sion  were  to  his  mind  states  whose  machinery  of  government 
had  been  seized  on  by  persons  in  insurrection  against  the  gov- 
eminent  of  the  United  States.  When,  therefore,  he  made 
his  call  for  75,000  militia  to  defend  the  Union,  he  apportioned 
the  number  among  all  the  states,  slave  and  free,  north  and 
south,  east  and  west,  according  to  their  population.  Those 
forming  the  Confederacy  paid  no  attention  to  the  call.  The 
governors  of  the  border  slave  states  (Delaware,  Maryland,  Vir 
ginia,  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  Missouri)  returned  evasive  or  in 
sulting  answers. 

But  the  people  of  the  loyal  states  responded  instantly,  and 

1  A  state  made  out  of  part  of  another  state  cannot  be  admitted  into  the 
nion  without  the  consent  of  that  state  first  obtained.     But  as  Congress 
and  the  people  of  West  Virginia  considered  that  Virginia  consisted  of  that 
part  of  the  Old  Dominion  which  remained  loyal  to  the  Union,  the  people 
practically  asked  their  own  consent. 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,   1861-1865 


387 


tens  of  thousands  of  troops  were  soon  on  their  way  to  Wash 
ington.  To  get  there  was  a  hard  matter.  Baltimore  lay  on 
^  the  most  direct  railroad  route  between  the  Eastern  and  Middle 
States  and  Washington.  But  Baltimore  was  full  of  disloyal 
"men,  who  tore  up  the  railroads,  burned  bridges,  cut  the  tele 
graph  wires,  and  as  the  Massachusetts  6th  regiment  was  passing 
through  the  city  from  one  railroad  station  to  another,  attacked 
it,  killing  some  and  wounding  others  of  its  soldiers.  This 
forced  the  troops  from  the  other  states  to  go  by  various  routes 
to  Annapolis  and  then  to  Washington,  so  that  it  was  late  in 
April  before  enough  arrived  to  insure  the  safety  of  the  city. 

Though  none  of  the  border  and  seceded  states  sent  troops, 

the  response  of  the  loyal  states  to  Lincoln's  call  was  so  hearty 

that  more  than  75,000  men  were  furnished.     The  President 

decided  to  turn  this  outburst  of  patriotism  to  good  purpose, 

and  May  3,  1861,  asked  for  42,034  volunteers  for  three  years 

unless  sooner  discharged,  and  ordered  18,000  seamen  to  be 

Unlisted,  and  22,714  men  added  to  the  regular  army.     Balti- 

-   more  was  now  occupied  by  Union  troops,  and  communication 

with  Washington  through  that  city  was  restored  and  protected. 

On  July  1,  1861,  there  were  183,588  «  boys  in  blue  "  under 

arms  and  present  for  duty.     These  were  distributed  at  various 

i   places   north   of  the   line,    2000   miles   long,    which    divided 

J   the  North  and  South.     This  line  began  near  Fort  Monroe,  in 

Virginia,  ran  up  Chesapeake   Bay  and  the   Potomac  to  the 

\  mountains,  then  across  Western  Virginia  and   through  Ken- 

~  tucky,  Missouri,  and  Indian  Territory  to  New  Mexico. 

\       This  line  was  naturally  divided  into  three  parts  : 

1.  That  in  Virginia  and  along  the  Potomac. 

2.  That  occupied  by  Kentucky,  a  state  which  had  declared 

itself  neutral. 

3.  That  west  of  the  Mississippi. 

431,   The  Battle  of  "  Bull  Run"  or  Manassas.  —  General  Win- 
field  Scott  was  in  command  of  the  Union  army.     Under  him, 

Washington,  was  General 


388      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

Irwin  McDowell.  Further  to  the  west,  near  Harpers  Ferry, 
was  a  Union  force  under  General  Patterson.  In  western 
Virginia,  with  an  army  raised  largely  in  Ohio,  was  General 
George  B.  McClellan.  In  Missouri  was  General  Lyon,  aided 
-by  all  the  Union  people  in  the  state,  who  were  engaged  in  a 
desperate  struggle  to  keep  her  in  the  Union. 

In  northern  Virginia  and  opposed  to  the  Union  forces  under 
General  McDowell,  was  a  Confederate  army  under  General 
Beatiregard,  and  these  troops  the  people  of  the  North  de 
manded  should  be  attacked.  "  The  Confederate  Congress 
must  not  meet  at  Richmond !  "  "  On  to  Richmond  !  On  to 
Richmond  ! "  became  the  cries  of  the  hour.  General  McDowell, 
with  30,000  men,  was  therefore  ordered  to  attack  Beauregard. 
McDowell  found  him  near  Manassas,  some  thirty  miles  south 
west  of  Washington,  and  there,  on  the  field  of  "  Bull  Run,"  on 
Sunday,  July  21,  1861,  was  fought  a  famous  battle  which 
ended  with  the  defeat  and  flight  of  the  Union  army.1 

General  George  B.  McClellan,  who  had  defeated  the  Confed 
erate  forces  in  western  Virginia  in  several  battles,  was  now 
placed  in  command  of  the  troops  near  Washington,  and  spent 
the  rest  of  1861  and  part  of  1862  in  drilling  and  organizing 
his  army.  Bull  Run  had  taught  the  people  two  things : 
1.  That  the  war  was  not  to  end  in  three  months  ;  2.  That  an 
army  without  discipline  is  not  much  better  than  a  mob. 

432.  Fort  Donelson  and  Fort  Henry.  —  While  McClellan  was 
drilling  his  men  along  the  Potomac,  the  Union  forces  drove 
back  the  Confederates  in  the  West.  The  Confederate  line 
at  first  extended  as  shown  by  the  heavy  line  on  the  map  on 
p.  390.  In  order  to  break  it,  General  Buell  sent  a  small  force 
under  General  Thomas,  in  January,  1862,  to  drive  back  the 
Confederates  near  Mill  Springs.  Next,  in  February,  General 
Halleck  authorized  General  U.  S.  Grant  and  Flag  Officer 
Foote  to  make  a  joint  expedition  against  Fort  Henry  on  the 
Tennessee.  But  Foote  arrived  first  and  captured  the  fort, 
whereupon  Grant  marched  to  Fort  Donelson  on  the  Cumber- 
1  Patties  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  229-239, 


WAR  FOR  THE   UNION,    1861-1865  389 

land,  eleven  miles  away,  and  after  three  days  of  sharp  fight 
ing  was  asked  by  General  Buckner  what  terms  he  would  offer. 
Grant  promptly  answered, 


Buckner  at  once  surrendered  (February  16,  1862),  and  Grant 
won  the  first  great  Union  victory  of  the  war.1 

433.  The  Battle  of  Shiloh,  or  Pittsburg  Landing.  —  After  the 
fall  of  Fort  Donelson,  the  Confederates,  abandoning  Colum 
bus  and  Nashville,  hurried  south  toward  Corinth  in  Mississippi, 
whither  Halleck's  army  followed  in  three  parts.  One  under 
General  S.  R.  Curtis  moved  to  southwestern  Missouri,  and  beat 
the  Confederates  at  Pea  Ridge,  Ark.  (March  6-8).  The  second, 
under  General  John  Pope,  cooperated  with  Flag  Officer  Foote, 
from  the  west  bank  of  the  Mississippi,. in  the  capture  of  Island 
No.  10  (April  7).  Pope  then  joined  Halleck  in  the  movement 
against  Corinth,  while  the  fleet  went  on  down  the  river,  attacked 
Fort  Pillow  three  times,  captured  it  (June  4),  and  two  days 
later  took  Memphis. 

Meanwhile  the  third  part  of  Halleck's  army,  under  Grant,  fol 
lowing  the  Confederates,  had  reached  Pittsburg  Landing,  where 

1  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  398-429 ;  Grant's 
Memoirs,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  285-315. 


390 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


-O^LMemphis        ir-ittsburg Ldg 
^'-.    CoFmTK 


Driving  back  the  Confederate  line  in  the  West 

(April:  6)  he  was  suddenly  attacked  by  General  A.  S.  Johnston 
and  driven  back.  But  General  Buell  coming  up  with  fresh 
troops,  the  battle  was  resumed  the  next  day  (April  7),  when 
Grant  regained  his  lost  ground,  and  the  Confederates  fell  back 
to  Corinth.1 

At  this  point  General  Henry  Halleck  arrived  and  took  com 
mand,  and  at  the  end  of  May  occupied  Corinth.  Memphis  then 
fell,  and  the  Mississippi  River  was  opened  as  far  south  as  Vicks- 
burg.  After  the  capture  of  Memphis,  Halleck  went  to  Wash 
ington  to  take  command  of  the  armies  of  the  United  States. 

434.  Bragg's  Raid  into  Kentucky.  —  The  Confederate  line 
which  in  January,  1862,  had  passed  across  Kentucky  had  thus 
by  June  been  driven  southward  to  Chattanooga,  luka,  and 
Holly  Springs.  The  Union  line  ran  from  near  Chattanooga  to 
Corinth  and  Memphis.  Against  this  the  Confederates  now 
moved,  with  the  hope  of  breaking  through  and  driving  it  back. 
Gathering  his  forces  at  Chattanooga,  General  Bragg  rushed 

1  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  465-486. 

7 


WAR   FOR   THE   UNION,    1861-1865  391 

across  Tennessee  and  Kentucky  toward  Louisville.  But 
General  Buell,  perceiving  his  purpose,  outmarched  him, 
reached  the  Ohio,  and  forced  Bragg  to  fall  back.  At  Perry- 
ville  (October  8,  1862),  Bragg  turned  furiously  on  Buell  and 
was  beaten. 

•435.  luka  and  Corinth.  — While  Bragg  was  raiding  Kentucky, 
Generals  Price  at  luka  and  Van  Dorn  at  Holly  Springs,  know 
ing  that  Grant's  army  had  been  greatly  weakened  by  sending 
troops  to  Buell.  prepared  to  attack  Corinth.  But  Grant,  think 
ing  he  could  fight  them  separately,  sent  Kosecrans  to  luka 
(September  19).  Price  was  not  captured,  but  retreated  to  Van 
Dorn,  and  the  two  then  fell  upon  Rosecrans  at  Corinth  (Octo 
ber  4),  only  to  be  beaten  and  chased  forty  miles. 

436.  Murfreesboro.  —  For  these  successes  Rosecrans  (October 
30)  was  given  command  of  Buell's  army,  then  centering  at  Nash 
ville.  Bragg  went  into  winter  quarters  at  Murfreesboro,  and 
thither  Rosecrans  advanced  to  attack  him.  The  contest  at 
Murfreesboro  (December  31,  18G2,  and  January  2,  1863)  was 
one  of  the  most  bloody  battles  of  the  whole  war.  Bragg  was 
.again  defeated,  and  retreated  to  a  position  farther  south. 
^37.  Arkansas.  —  In  January,  1862,  the  Confederate  line 
west  of  the  Mississippi  extended  from  Belmont  across  southern 
Missouri  to  the  Indian  Territory.  Against  the  west  end  of 
this  line  General  Curtis  moved  in  February,  1862,  and  after 
driving  the  Confederates  under  Van  Dorn  and  Price  out  of 
Missouri,  beat  them  in  the  desperate  battle  at  Pea  Ridge, 
Arkansas  (March  6-8,  1862),  and  moved  to  the  interior  of  the 
state.  Price  and  Van  Dorn  went  east  into  Mississippi  (see 
§  435),  and  when  the  year  closed  the  Union  forces  were  in  con 
trol  north  of  the  Arkansas  River,  and  along  the  west  bank  of 
the  Mississippi.  On  the  east  bank  the  only  fortified  positions 
in  Confederate  hands  were  Vicksburg,  Grand  Gulf,  and  Port 
Hudson. 

438.  Farragut  captures  New  Orleans.  —  While  Foote  was 
opening  the  upper  part  of  the  Mississippi,  a  naval  expedition 
under  Farragut,  supported  by  an  army  under  Butler,  had  cleared 


•\       ^  ^  \, 

392      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

*  •^•*          Ml  £> 

the  lower  part  of  the  river.     TlreSe  »rces  had  been  sent  by 

sea  to  capture  New  Orleans.  The  defenses  of  the  city  con 
sisted  of  two  strong  forts  almost  directly  opposite  each  other  on 
the  banks  of  the  river,  about  seventy -five  miles  south  of  the 
city ;  of  two  great  chain  cables  stretched  across  the  river  below 
the  forts  to  prevent  ships  coming  up ;  and  of  fifteen  armed  ves 
sels  above  the  forts.  New  Orleans  was  thought  to  be  safe.  But 
Farragut  was  not  dismayed.  Sailing  up  the  river  till  he  came 
to  the  chains,  he  bombarded  the  forts  for  six  days  and  nights, 
while  the  forts  did  their  best  to  destroy  liim.  Then,  finding 
he  could  do  nothing  in  this  way,  he  cut  the  chains,  ran  his 
ships  past  the  forts  in  spite  of  a  dreadful  fire  (April  24,  1862), 
destroyed  the  Confederate  fleet  (April  25),  and  took  the  city. 
General  Butler,  who  had  been  waiting  at  Ship  Island  with 
15,000  men,  then  entered  and  held  New  Orleans.1 

439.  The  Peninsular  Campaign  against  Richmond.  — The  signal 
success  of  Grant  and  Farragut  in  the  West  was  more  than  offset 
by  the  signal  failure  of  McClellan  in  the  East.  The  wish 
of  the  administration,  and  indeed  of  the  whole  North,  was 
that  Richmond  should  be  captured.  Against  it,  therefore,  the 
Army  of  the  Potomac  was  to  move.  But  by  what,  route  ? 
The  government  wanted  McClellan  to  march  south  across 
Virginia,  so  that  his  army  should  always  be  between  the  Con 
federate  forces  and  Washington.  McClellan  insisted  on  mov-  ^ 
ing  west  from  Chesapeake  Bay.  The  result  was  a  compromise:^ 

1.  Forces  under  Fremont  and  Banks  were  to  operate  in  the 

Shenandoah    valley    and    prevent   a   Confederate   force 
attacking  Washington  from  the  west. 

2.  -An  army  under  McDowell  was  to  march  from  Fredericks- 

burg  to  Richmond. 

3.  McClellan  was  to  take  the  main  army  from  Washington  by 

water  to  Fort  Monroe,  and  then  march  up  the  penin 
sula  to  Richmond,  where  McDowell  was  to  join  him. 

1  Farragut,  after  taking  New  Orleans,  went  up  the  river  and  captured 
Baton  Rouge  and  Natchez. 


/ 


WAR  TOR*  THE   UNION,  1861-1865 


393 


This  peninsula,  frorn'Vhich  the  campaign  gets  its  name, 
lies  between  the  York  and  James  rivers.  Landing  at  the 
lower  end  of  it,  McClellan  was  met  by  General  Joseph  E.  John 
ston,  who  caused  a  long  delay  by  forcing  him  to  besiege 
Yorktown.  McClellan  then  advanced  up  the  peninsula,  fighting 
the  battle  of  Williams  burg  on  the  way.  At  White  House  Land 
ing  he  turned  toward 
Richmond,  extending 
his  right  flank  to 
Hanover  Courthouse, 
where  McDowell  was 


expected  to  join  him.  But  this 
was  not  to  be,  for  General  T.  J. 
Jackson  ("Stonewall"  Jackson) 
rushed  down  the  Shenandoah 
valley,  driving  Banks  over  the  Potomac  into  Maryland,  and  re 
treated  south  before  Fremont  or  McDowell  could  cut  him  off; 
during  this  campaign  he.  won  four  desperate  battles  in  thirty -five 
days.  Jackson's  success  alarmed  Washington,  and  McDowell 
Avas  held  in  northern  Virginia.  McClellan's  army,  meanwhile,  ad 
vanced  on  both  sides  of  the  Chickahominy  River  to  within  eight 
miles  of  Richmond.  At  Fair  Oaks  and  Seven  Pines  (May  31) 
his  left  flank  was  almost  overwhelmed  by  Johnston;  but  the 
latter  was  wounded  and  his  troops  defeated.  Johnston  was  then 
McM.  HIST.  —22 


1 

894      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

succeeded  by  R.  E.  Lee,  who,  joined  by  Jackson,  attacked 
McClellan  at  Mechanicsville  and  Gaines  Mill,  and  forced  him  to 
fall  back,  lighting  for  six  days  (June  26  to  July  1,  18G2)1  as  he 
retreated  to  J  larrisons  Landing,  on  the  James  River.  There  the 
army  remained  till  August,  when  it  was  recalled  to  the  Potomac. 

440.  Lee's  Raid  into  Maryland  ;  Battle  of  Antietam,  or  Sharps- 
burg. —  While  the   Army  of  the  Potomac  was  at    Harrisons 
Landing,  a  new  force  called  the  Army  of  Virginia  was  organ 
ized,  and  General  John  Pope  placed  in  command.     At  the 
same  time  General  Ilalleck  was  recalled  from  the  West  and 
made  general  in  chief  of  the  Union  armies.     Pope  intended 
to  move  straight  against  Richmond.     But  when  McClellan  in 
obedience  to  orders  left  Harrisons  Landing  and  took  his  army 
by  water  to  the  Potomac,  near  Washington,  the  Confederate 
army  was  left  free  to  act  as  it  pleased.     Seeing  his  opportunity, 
Lee  moved  at  once  against  Pope's  army,  whose  line  stretched 
along  the  Rappahannock  and  Rapidan  rivers  to  the  Shenan- 
doah  valley  in  western  Virginia.     Near  the  Rapidan  at  Cedar 
Mountain  was  General  Banks.      He  was  first  attacked  and 
beaten  ;  after  which  Lee  fell  upon  Pope  on  the  old  field  of  Bull 
Run,  and  put  the  army  to  flight.     Pope  fell  back  to  Washing 
ton,  where  his  forces  were  united  with  those  of  McClellan. 
Pushing  northward,  Lee  next  crossed  the  Potomac  and  entered 
Maryland.     But  he  was  overtaken  by  McClellan  at  Antietam 
Creek,  near  Sharpsburg,  where,  September  17,  1862,  a  great 
battle  was  fought,  after  which  Lee  went  back  to  Virginia. 

McClellan  was  now  removed  and  the  command  of  the  army 
given  to  General  Burnside.  He  was  as  reckless  as  McClellan 
was  cautious,  and  on  December  13  threw  his  army  against  the 
Confederates  posted  at  Frederieksburg  Heights  and  was  beaten 
with  dreadful  slaughter.  Thus  at  the  end  of  1862  Richmond 
was  not  captured,  and  the  two  armies  went  into  winter  quarters 
with  the  Rappahannock  River  between  them. 

441.  Emancipation  of  the  Slaves.  —  More  than  two  years  had 
now  passed  since  South  Carolina  had  seceded,  and  during  this 

1  The  "  Seven  Days1  Battles  "  are  these  aiid  oue  fought  June  25. 


WAR  FOR  THE   UNION,   1801-1806  395 

time  a  great  change  had  taken  place  in  the  feeling  of  the 
North  towards  slavery.  When  Lincoln  was  inaugurated,  very 
few  people  wanted  the  slaves  emancipated.  But  two  years  of 
bloody  fighting  had  convinced  the  North  that  the  Union  could 
not  exist  part  slave,  part  free.  As  Lincoln  said  in  his  speech 
at  Springfield  in  1858,  "It  must  be  all  one  thing,  or  all  the 
other."  Seeing  that  the  people  now  felt  as  he  did,  Lincoln,  in 
18G2  (March  6),  asked  Congress  to  agree  to  buy  the  slaves  of 
the  loyal  slave  states,  and  urged  the  members  of  Congress 
from  those  states  to  advise  their  constituents  to  set  free 
their  slaves  and  receive  $300  apiece  for  them.  This  they 
would  not  do;  whereupon  he  decided  to  act  upon  his  own 
authority,  and  declared  all  slaves  within  the  lines  of  the  Con 
federacy  to  be  freemen. 

For  this  he  had  two  good  reasons:  1.  So  far  the  war  had 
been  one  for  the  preservation  of  the  Union.  By  making  it  a 
war  for  union  and  freedom  the  North  would  become  more 
earnest  than  ever.  2.  The  rulers  of  England,  who  wauled 
Southern  cotton,  were  only  waiting  for  a  pretext  to  acknowledge 
the  independence  of  the  South.  If,  however,  the  North  engaged 
in  a  war  for  the  abolition  of  slavery,  the  people  of  England 
would  not  allow  the  independence  of  the  Confederacy  to  be 
acknowledged  by  their  rulers. 

The  time  to  make  such  a  declaration  was  after  some  victory 
gained  by  the  Union  army.  When  McClellan  and  Lee  stood 
face  to  face  at  Antietam,  Lincoln  therefore  "  vowed  to  God  " 
that  if  Lee  were  defeated  he  would  issue  the  proclamation. 
Lee  was  defeated,  and,  on  September  22,  1862,  the  proclama 
tion  came  forth  declaring  that  if  the  Confederate  States  did 
not  return  to  their  allegiance  before  January  1,  18G3,  "  all  per 
sons  held  as  slaves"  within  the  Confederate  lines  "shall  be 
then,  thenceforth,  and  forever  free."  The  states  of  course 
did  not  return  to  their  allegiance,  and  on  January  1,  1803, 
a  second  proclamation  was  issued  setting  the  slaves  free.1 

Now,  there  are  three  things  in  connection  with  the  Emanci- 
1  Nicolay  and  Hay's  Life  of  Lincoln,  Vol.  VI.,  Chaps.  0,  8. 


396      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

pation  Proclamation  which  must  be  understood  and  remem 
bered: 

1.  Lincoln  did  not  abolish  slavery  anywhere.     He  emancipated 

or  set  free  the  slaves  of  certain  persons  engaged  in  waging 
war  against  the  United  States  government. 

2.  The  Emancipation  Proclamation  did  not  apply  to  any  of 

the  loyal  slave  states,1  nor  to  such  territory  as  the 
Union  army  had  reconquered.2  In  none  of, these  places 
did  it  free  slaves. 

3.  Lincoln  freed  the  slaves  by  virtue  of  his  power  as  com 

mander  in  chief  of  the  army  of  the  United  States,  "and 
as  a  fit  and  necessary  war  measure." 

442.  The  Battle  of  Gettysburg.  —  After  Burnside  was  de 
feated  at  Fredericks  burg,  in  December,  1862,  he  was  removed, 
and  General  Hooker  put  in  command  of  the  Army  of  the 
Potomac.  Hooker  —  "Fighting  Joe,"  as  he  was  called  —  led 
it  against  Lee,  and  (May  1-4,  1863)  was  beaten  at  Chancel- 
lorsville  and  fell  back.  In  June  Lee  again  took  the  offensive, 
rushed  down  the  Shenandoah  valley  to  the  Potomac,  crossed 
Maryland,  and  entered  Pennsylvania,  with  the  Army  of  the 
Potomac  in  pursuit.  On  reaching  Maryland,  Hooker  was 
removed  and  General  Meade  put  in  command.  The  opposing 
forces  met  on  the  hills  at  Gettysburg,  Penn.,  and  there,  July 
1-3,  Lee  attacked  Meade.  The  contest  was  a  dreadful  one;  no 
field  was  ever  more  stubbornly  fought  over.  About  one  fourth 
of  the  men  engaged  were  killed  or  wounded.  But  the  splendid 
courage  of  the  Union  army  prevailed :  Lee  was  beaten  and  re 
tired  to  Virginia,  where  he  remained  unmolested  till  the  spring 
of  1864.  Gettysburg  is  regarded  as  the  greatest  battle  of  the 
war,  and  the  Union  regiments  engaged  have  taken  a  just  pride 
in  marking  the  positions  they  held  during  the  three  awful  days 
of  slaughter,  till  the  field  is  dotted  all  over  with  beautiful  mon- 

1  Delaware,  Maryland,  West  Virginia,  Kentucky,  and  Missouri. 
•Tennessee,  thirteen  parishes  in  Louisiana,  and  seven  counties  in 
Virginia. 


WAR   FOK   THE   UNION,    1861-1865 


397 


Part  of  the  battlefield  of  Gettysburg 

uments.  On  the  hill  back  of  the  village  is  a  great  national 
cemetery,  at  the  dedication  of  which  Lincoln  delivered  his 
famous  Gettysburg  address. 

443.  Vicksburg.  — The  day  after  the  victory  at  Gettysburg, 
the  joy  of  the  North  was  yet  more  increased  by  the  news  that 
Vicksburg  had  surrendered  (July  4)  to  Grant.  After  the  de 
feat  of  the  Confederate  forces  at  luka  and  Corinth  in  1862, 
the  Confederate  line  passed  across  northern  Mississippi,  touched 
the  river  from  Vicksburg  to  Port  Hudson,  and  then  swept  off 
to  the  Gulf.  As  the  capture  of  these  river  towns  would  complete 
the  opening  of  the  Mississippi,  Grant  set  out  to  take  Vicks 
burg.  Failing  in  a  direct  advance  through  Mississippi,  Grant 
sent  a  strong  force  down  the  river  from  Memphis,  and  later 
took  command  in  person.  Vicksburg  stands  on  the  top  of  a 
bluff  which  rises  steep  and  straight  200  feet  above  the  river, 
and  had  been  so  fortified  that  to  capture  it  seemed  impossible. 


398 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


But  Grant  was  determined  to  open  the  river.  On  the  west 
bank,  he  cut  a  canal  through  a  bend,  hoping  to  divert  the  river 
and  get  water  passage  by  the  town.  This  failed,  and  he  de 
cided  to  cross  below  the  town  and  attack  from  the  land.  To 
aid  him  in  this  attempt,  Porter  ran  his  gunboats  past  the 
town  one  night  in  April  and  carried  the  army  over  the 
river.  Landing  on  the  east  bank,  Grant  won  a  victory  at 

Port  Gibs'on,  and 
occupied  Grand  Gulf. 
Hearing  that  John 
ston  was  coming  to 
help  Pemberton, 
Grant  pushed  in  be 
tween  them,  beat 
Johnston  at  Jackson, 
and  turning  west 
ward,  drove  Pember 
ton  into  Vicksburg, 
and  began  a  regular 
siege.  For  seven 
weeks  he  poured  in 
shot  and  shell  day 
and  night.  To  live 
in  houses  became  im 
possible,  and  the 
women  and  children 

took  refuge  in  caves.  Food  gave  out,  and  after  every  kind  of 
misery  had  been  endured  till  it  could  be  borne  no  longer, 
Vicksburg  was  surrendered  on  July  4. 

Five  days  later  (July  9,  1863),  Port  Hudson  surren 
dered,  and  the  Mississippi,  as  Lincoln  said,  "  flowed  unvexed 
to  the  sea."  It  was  open  from  its  source  to  its  mouth,  and 
the  Confederacy  was  cut  in  two. 

444.  Driving  the  Confederates  eastward;  Chickamauga  and 
Chattanooga.  —  While  Grant  was  besieging  Vicksburg,  Rose- 
crans  by  skillful  work  forced  Bragg  to  retreat  from  his  position 


.  WAR   FOR   THE   UNION,   1861-1865  399 

south,  of  Murfreesboro ;  then  in  a  second  campaign  he  forced 
Bragg  to  leave  Chattanooga  and  retire  into  northwestern 
Georgia.  Bragg  here  received  more  troops,  and  attacked  Rose- 
crans  in  the  Chickamauga  valley  (September  19  and  20,  1863), 
where  was  fought  one  of  the  most  desperate  battles  of  the  war. 
So  fierce  was  the  onset  of  the  Confederates  that  the  Union 
right  wing  was  driven  from  the  field.  But  the  left  wing, 
under  General  George  H.  Thomas,  a  grand  character  and  a 
splendid  officer,  by  some  of  the  best  fighting  ever  seen  held  the 
enemy  in  check  and  saved  the  army  from  rout.  By  his  firm 
ness  Thomas  won  the  name  of  "  the  Rock  of  Chick  am  auga." 

Rosecrans  now  went  back  to  Chattanooga.  Bragg  followed, 
and  taking  position  on  the  hills  and  mountains  which  surround 
the  town  on  the  east  and  south,  shut  in  the  Union  army 
and  besieged  it.  For  a  time  it  seemed  in  danger  of  starva 
tion.  But  Hooker  was  sent  from  Virginia  with  more  troops ; 
the  Army  of  the  Tennessee  under  Sherman  was  summoned 
from  Vicksburg ;  Kosecrans  was  superseded  by  Thomas,  and 
Grant  was  put  in  command  of  all.  Then  matters  changed. 
The  forces  under  Thomas,  moving  from  their  lines,  seized  some 
low  hills  at  the  foot  of  Missionary  Ridge,  east  of  Chattanooga 
(November  23).  On  the  24th,  Hooker  carried  the  Confederate 
works  on  Lookout  Mountain,  southwest  of  the  city,  in  a  con 
flict  often  called  the  "  Battle  above  the  Clouds  "  ;  and  Sherman 
was  sent  against  the  northern  end  of  Missionary  Ridge,  but 
succeeded  only  in  taking  an  outlying  hill.  On  the  25th  Sher 
man  renewed  his  attack,  but  failed  to  gain  the  main  crest, 
whereupon  Thomas  attacked  the  Ridge  in  front  of  Chattanooga, 
carried  the  heights,  and  drove  off  the  enemy.  Bragg  retreated 
to  Dalton,  in  northwestern  Georgia,  where  the  command  of  his 
army  was  given  to  Joseph  E.  Johnston. 

445.  "Marching  through  Georgia";  "From  Atlanta  to  the 
Sea." --As  the  Confederates  had  thus  been  driven  from  the 
.Mississippi  River,  and  forced  back  to  the  mountains,  they  had 
but  two  centers  of  power  left.  The  one  was  the  army  under 
Lee,  which,  since  the  defeat  at  Gettysburg,  had  been  lying 


MM. 


1 

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E       .x 

90                    Longitude 

Wesl 

400 


New  Yo 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION 

Breaking  the  Confederate  Line 


401 


402       THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

quietly  behind  the  Rapidan  and  Rappahannock  rivers,  pro 
tecting  Richmond.  The  other  was  the  army  at  Dalton,  Ga., 
now  under  J.  E.  Johnston. 

Early  in  the  spring  of  1864  General  U.  S.  Grant  —  "  Uncon 
ditional  Surrender  Grant,"  as  the  people  called  him  —  was 
made  lieutenant  general  (a  rank  never  before  given  to  any  United 
States  soldier  except  Washington  and  Scott),  and  put  in  com 
mand  of  all  the  Federal  armies.  General  Sherman  was  left 
in  command  of  the  military  division  of  the  Mississippi. 

Before  beginning  the  campaign,  Grant  and  Sherman  agreed 
on  a  plan.  Grant,  with  the  Army  of  the  Potomac,  was  to  drive 
back  Lee  and  take  Richmond.  Sherman,  with  the  armies  of 
Thomas,  McPherson,  and  Schofield,  was  to  attack  Johnston 
and  push  his  way  into  Georgia.  Each  was  to  begin  his  move 
ment  on  the  same  day  (May  4,  1864). 

On  that  day,  accordingly,  Sherman  with  98,000  men  marched 
against  Johnston,  flanked  him  out  of  Dalton,  and  step  by 
step  through  the  mountains  to  Atlanta,  fighting  all  the  way. 
Johnston's  retreat  was  masterly.  He  intended  to  retreat  until 
Sherman's  army  was  so  weakened  by  leaving  guards  in  the 
rear  to  protect  the  railroads,  over  which  food  and  supplies 
must  come,  that  he  could  fight  on  equal  terms.  But  Jefferson 
Davis  removed  Johnston  at  Atlanta,  and  put  J.  B.  Hood  in 
command. 

Hood,  in  July,  made  three  furious  attacks,  was  beaten  each 
time;  abandoned  Atlanta  in  September,  and  soon  after  started 
northwestward,  in  hope  of  drawing  Sherman  out  of  Georgia. 
But  Sherman  sent  Thomas  and  a  part  of  the  army  to  Tennessee, 
and  after  following  Hood  for  a  time,  he  returned  to  Atlanta, 
tearing  up  the  railroads  as  he  went.  Then,  having  partly 
burned  the  town,  in  November  he  started  for  the  sea  with 
60,000  of  his  best  veterans. 

The  troops  went  in  four  columns,  covering  a  belt  of  sixty  miles 
wide,  burning  bridges,  tearing  up  railroads,  living  on  the  coun 
try  as  they  inarched.  Early  in  December  the  army  drew  near 
to  Savannah  j  about  the  middle  of  the  month  (December  13) 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,    1861-1865 


403 


Fort  McAllister  was  taken ;  and  a  few  days  later  the  city  of 
Savannah  was  occupied.  During  all  this  long  march  to  the 
sea,  nothing  was  known  in  the  North  as  to  where  Sherman  was 


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SHERMAN'S  MARCH 
TO  THE  SEA 

SCALE  OF   MILES 
0  50  100  200) 


or  what  he  was  doing.     Fancy  the  delight  of  Lincoln,  then, 
when  on  the  Christmas  eve  of  1864,  he  received  this  telegram : 

SAVANNAH,  Georgia,  December  22,  1864. 
To  His  EXCELLENCY,  PRESIDENT  LINCOLN,  WASHINGTON,  D.C. 

I  beg  to  present  you  as  a  Christmas  gift  the  city  of  Savannah,  with 
one  hundred  and  fifty  heavy  guns  and  plenty  of  ammunition  ;  also  about 
twenty-five  thousand  bales  of  cotton. 

W.  T.  SHERMAN,  MAJOR  GENERAL. 

Sherman  had  sent  the  message  by  vessel  to  Fort  Monroe, 
whence  it  was  telegraphed  to  Lincoln. 

446.  Sherman  marches  northward.  —  At  Savannah  the  army 
rested  for  a  month.  Sherman  tells  us  in  his  Memoirs  that  the 


404  THE   LONG  STRUGGLE   WITH   SLAVERY 

troops  grew  impatient  at  this  delay,  and  used  to  call  out  to  him 
as  he  rode  by :  "  Uncle  Billy,  I  guess  Grant  is  waiting  for  us 
at  Richmond."  So  he  was ;  but  he  did  not  wait  very  long,  for 
on  February  1,  1865,  the  march  was  resumed.  The  way  was 
across  South  Carolina  to  Columbia,  and  then  into  North  Caro 
lina,  with  their  old  enemy,  J.  E.  Johnston,  in  their  front. 
Hood,  in  a  rash  moment,  had  besieged  Thomas  at  Nashville ; 
but  Thomas,  coming  out  from  behind  his  intrenchments,  utterly 
destroyed  Hood's  army.  This  forced  Davis  to  put  Johnston 
in  command  of  a  new  army  made  up  of  troops  taken  from  the 
seaport  garrisons  and  remnants  of  Hood's  army.  In  March, 
Sherman  reached  Goldsboro  in  North  Carolina. 

447.  Grant  in  Virginia.  —  Meantime  Grant  had  set  out  from 
Culpeper  Courthouse  on  May  4,  1864,  crossed  the   Rapidan, 
and  entered  the   "  Wilderness,"  a  name  given  to  a  tract  of 
country  covered  with  dense  woods  of  oak  and  pine  and  thick 
undergrowth.     The  fighting  was  almost  incessant.     The  loss 
of  life  was  frightful ;  but  he  pushed  on  to  Spottsylvania  Court 
house,  and  thence  to  Cold  Harbor,  part  of  the  line  of  fortifica 
tions  before  Richmond.     He  would,  as  he  said,  "  fight  it  out  on 
this  line  if  it  takes  all  summer,"  and  went  south  of  Richmond 
and  besieged  Petersburg. 

448.  Early's  Raid,  1864.  —  Lee  now  sent  Jubal  Early  with 
20,000  soldiers  to  move  down  the   Shenandoah  valley,  enter 
Maryland,  and  threaten  Washington.     This  he  did,  and  after 
coming  up  to  the  fortifications  of  the  city,  he   retreated  to 
Virginia.     A  little  later,  Early  sent  his  cavalry  into  Pennsyl 
vania  and  burned  Chambersburg. 

Grant  thought  it  was  time  to  stop  this,  and  sent  Sheridan 
with  an  army  to  drive  Early  out  of  the  Shenandoah  valley. 
"It  is  desirable,"  said  Grant,  "that  nothing  should  be  left  to 
invite  the  enemy  to  return." 

Sheridan  set  out  accordingly,  and  on  September  19  he  met 
Early  in  battle  at  Winchester,  and  a  few  days  later  at  Fishers 
Hill,  beat  him  at  both  places,  and  sent  him  whirling  up  the 
valley.  Sheridan  followed  for  a  time,  and  then  brought  his 

t 


WAR  FOR  THE  UNION,  1861-1865  405 

army  back   to  Cedar  Creek,  after  burning  barns,  destroying 
crops,  and  devastating  the  entire  upper  valley. 

449.  Sheridan's  Ride.  —  And  now  occurred  a  famous  incident. 
About  the  middle  of  October  Sheridan  went  to  Washington, 
and  while  on  his  way  back  slept  on  the  night  of  October  18  at 
Winchester.     At  7  A.M.  on  the  19th*  he  heard  guns,  but  paid  no 
attention  to  the  sounds  till  9  o'clock,  when,  as  he  rode  quietly 
out  of  Winchester,  he  met  a  mile  from  town  wagon  trains  and 
fugitives,  and  heard  that  Early  had  surprised  his  camp  at  day 
light.     Dashing  up  the  pike  with  an  escort  of  twenty  men, 
calling  to  the  fugitives  as  he  passed  them  to  turn  and  face  the 
enemy,  he  met  the  army  drawn  up  in  line  eleven  miles  from 
Winchester.     "  Far  away  in  the  rear,"  says  an  old  soldier, 
"  we  heard  cheer  after  cheer.     Were  reinforcements  coming  ? 
Yes,  Phil  Sheridan  was  coming,  and  -he  was  a  host."     Dashing 
down  the  line,  Sheridan  shouted,  "  What  troops  are  these  ?  " 
"  The  Sixth  Corps,"  came  back  the  response  from  a  hundred 
voices.     "  We  are  all  right,"  said  Sheridan,  as  he  swung  his 
old  hat  and  dashed  along  the  line  to  the  right.     "Never  mind, 
boys,  we'll  whip  them  yet.     We  shall  sleep  in  our  old  quarters 
to-night."     And  they  did.1     Early  was  defeated. 

450.  Surrender  of  Lee.  —  At  the  beginning  of  1865  the  situa 
tion  of  Lee  was  desperate,  and  in  February,  Alexander  H. 
Stephens,  Vice  President  of  the  Confederacy,  met  Lincoln. and 
Secretary  Seward  on  a  war  vessel  in  Hampton  Roads  to  discuss 
terms  of  peace.     Lincoln  demanded  three  things  :  1.    That  the 
Confederate   armies   be    disbanded    and  the  men   sent  home. 

2.  That  the  Confederate  States  submit  to  the  rule  of  Congress. 

3.  That  slavery  be  abolished.     These  terms  were  not  accepted, 
and  the  war  went  on.     Sherman  marched  northward  through 
the  Carolinas  and  was  reenforced  from  the  coast ;  every  sea 
port  in  the  Confederacy  was  soon  in  Union  hands;  Sheridan 
finally   dispersed    Early's    troops,    and    joined    Grant   before 
Petersburg ;  and  the  lines  of  Grant's  army  were  drawn  closer 
and  closer  around  Petersburg  and  Richmond. 

1  Read  Sheridan's  account  in  his  Personal  Memoirs,  Vol.  II.,  pp.  66-92. 


406      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

Plainly  the  end  was  near.  On  April  2  Lee  announced  to 
Davis  that  both  Petersburg  and  Richmond  must  be  abandoned 
at  once.  The  rams  in  the  James  River  were  immediately 
blown  up,  and  on  the  morning  of  April  3  General  Weitzel, 
hearing  from  a  negro  what  was  going  on,  entered  Richmond 
and  found  that  Lee  was  in  full  retreat.  Grant  followed,  and 
on  April  9  forced  Lee  to  surrender  at  Appomattox  Courthouse, 
seventy-five  miles  west  of  Richmond.  Grant's  treatment  of 
Lee  was  most  generous.  He  was  not  required  to  give  up  his 
sword,  nor  his  officers  their  side  arms,  nor  his  men  their  horses, 


The  house  in  which  Lee  and  Grant  arranged  the  surrender 

which  they  would  need,  Grant  said,  ato  work  their  little 
farms."  Each  officer  was  to  give  his  parole  not  to  take  up  arms 
against  the  United  States  "until  properly  exchanged";  each 
regimental  commander  was  to  do  the  same  for  his  men;  and, 
"  this  done,  each  officer  and  man  will  be  allowed  to  return  to  his 
home."  Immediately  after  this  surrender  25,000  rations  were 
issued  to  Lee's  men. 

451.  End  of  the  Confederacy.  —  What  little  was  left  of  the 
Confederacy  now  went  rapidly  to  pieces.  On  April  26  John 
ston  surrendered  to  Sherman  near  Raleigh,  North  Carolina. 
A  few  days  later  the  victorious  army  started  for  Richmond, 


WAR  FOR  THE   UNION,    1861-1865  407 

and  then  went  on  over  battle-scarred  Virginia  to  Washington. 
May  10,  Jefferson  Davis  was  captured.  When  Lee  fled  from 
Richmond,  Davis  hurried  to  Charlotte,  N.C.,  with  his  cabinet, 
his  clerks,  and  such  gold  ami  silver  coin  as  was  in  the  Con 
federate  Treasury.  But  the  surrender  of  Johnston  forced 
Davis  to  retreat  still  farther  south,  till  he  reached  Irwins- 
ville,  Ga.,  where  the  Union  cavalry  overtook  him. 

452.  The  Grand  Army  disbands.  —  As  this  was  practically  the 
end  of  the  Confederacy,  the  great  Union  army  of  citizen  soldiers, 
numbering  more  than  1,000,000  men,  was  called  home  from  the 
field  arid  disbanded.  Before  these  veterans  separated,  never 
to  meet  again  with  arms  in  their  hands,  they  were  reviewed 
by  the  President,  Congress,  and  an  immense  throng  of  people 
who  came  to  Washington  from  every  part  of  the  loyal  states 
to  welcome  them.  During  two  days  (May  23  and  24, 1865)  the 
soldiers  of  Grant  and  Sherman,  forming  a  column  thirty  miles 
long,  marched  down  Pennsylvania  Avenue,  and  then,  with  a 
rapidity  and  quietness  that  seems  almost  incredible,  scattered 
and  went  back  to  their  farms,  to  their  shops,  to  the  practice  of 
their  professions,  and  to  the  innumerable  occupations  of  civil 
life. 

Of  the  Confederates  not  one  was  molested,  not  a  soldier  was 
imprisoned,  not  a  political  leader  suffered  death.  Davis  was 
ordered  to  be  imprisoned  at  Fort  Monroe  for  two  years,  but 
he  was  soon  released  on  bail,  was  never  brought  to  trial,  and 
died  at  New  Orleans  in  1889. 

SUMMARY 

1.  After  the  election  of  Lincoln  seven  states  seceded  from  the  Union, 

and  formed  the  "  Confederate  States  of  America." 

2.  Four  other  states  joined  the  Confederacy  later. 

3.  The  refusal  of  the  United  States  to  recognize  the  right  to  secede  led  to 

the  refusal  to  give  up  Federal  forts  in  Charleston  harbor.     The 
attempt  to  take  Sumter  by  force  led  to  the  appeal  to  arms. 

4.  The  line  which  separated  the  troops  of  the  two  governments  ran  from 

Chesapeake  Bay,  across  Virginia,  and  through  Kentucky  and  Mis 
souri,  to  New  Mexico. 


408 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


5.  While  the  Union  troops  held  the  Confederates  in  check  on  the  eastern 

end  of  the  line,  they  broke  through  the  line  in  the  West,  and,  aided 
.  by  the  Union  fleet,  opened  the  Mississippi  River. 

6.  The  Confederates  were  thus  driven  from  the  Mississippi  and  forced 

back  to  the  mountains  of  Georgia.  Sherman  was  sent  against  them, 
and  in  1864  inarched  eastward  through  the  heart  of  the  Confederacy 
to  the  Atlantic. 

7.  Marching  north  from  Savannah,  across  Georgia  and  South  Carolina, 

to  Goldsboro  in  North  Carolina,  he  was  now  in  the  rear  of  the  Con 
federate  army  in  Virginia. 

8.  Grant,  meantime,  with  the  Army  of  the  Potomac,  had  fought  a  series 

of  battles  with  Lee,  and  had  besieged  Richmond  and  Petersburg  ; 
and  Sheridan  had  cleared  out  the  Shenandoah  valley. 

9.  Lee  was  thus  forced,  early  in   1865,  to   leave  Richmond,  and  while 

retreating  westward  he  was  forced  to  surrender. 


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CHAPTER  XXVIII 

WAR  ALONG  THE   COAST  AND   ON  THE   SEA 

453.  State  of  our  Navy  in  1861.  —  On  the  day  our  flag  went 
down  at  Sumter,  the  navy  of  the  United  States  consisted  of 
ninety  vessels  of   every  sort.      Fifty   of  these   were   sailing 
ships.     Forty  were  propelled  by  steam.      Of  the  steam  fleet 
one  was  on  the  Lakes,  five  were  unserviceable,  seventeen  were 
in  foreign  parts,  and  nine  laid  up  in  navy  yards  and  out  of 
service.     Eight  steam  vessels  (one  a  mere  tender)  and  five 
sailing  vessels  (a  fleet  of  thirteen)  made  up  the  naval  force  of 
the  United  States  that  was   available  for  actual  service  on 
April  15,  1861. 

454.  The  Work  before  the  Navy.  —  The  duty  of  the  navy 
was  to 

1.  Blockade  the  coast  from  Norfolk  in  Virginia  to  the  Rio 

Grande  in  Texas. 

2.  Capture  the  seaports  and  forts  scattered  along  this  coast. 

3.  Acquire  control  of  the  sounds  and  bays,  as  Chesapeake, 

Albemarle,  Pamlico,  Mobile,  and  Galveston. 

4.  Assist  the  army  in  opening  the  Mississippi,  Arkansas,  and 

other  rivers. 

5.  Destroy  all  Confederate  cruisers  and  protect  the  commerce 

of  the  United  States. 

To  accomplish  this  great  work,  most  of  the  vessels  abroad 
were  recalled  (a  slow  process  in  days  when  no  ocean  cable 
existed),  more  were  hastily  built,  and  in  time  400  merchantmen 
and  river  steamboats  were  bought  and  roughly  adapted  at  the 
navy  yards  for  war  service. 

410 


WAR   ALONG  THE   COAST   AND   ON   THE    SEA         411 

455.  The  Blockade  of  the  Southern  Coast. — The  war  on  sea 

was  opened  (April  19-27, 1861)  by  two  proclamations  of  Lincoln 
declaring  the  coast  from  Virginia  to  Texas  blockaded.  This 
meant  that  armed  vessels  were  to  be  stationed  off  the  seaports 
of  the  South,  and  that  no  ships  from  any  country  were  to  be 
allowed  to  go  into  or  out  of  them.  To  stop  trade  with  the 
South  was  important  for  three  reasons : 

1.  The  South  had  no  ships,  no  great  gun  factories,  machine 

shops,  or  rolling  mills,  and  must  look  to  foreign  countries 
for  military  supplies. 

2.  The  South  raised  (in  1860)  4,700,000  bales  of  cotton,  almost 

all  of  which  was  sold  to  England  and  the  North,  and  if 
this  cotton  should  be  sent  abroad,  the  South  could  easily 
buy  with  it  all  the  guns,  ships,  and  goods  she  needed. 

3.  England  was  dependent  on  the  South  for  raw  cotton,  and 

would  sell  for  it  everything  the  South  wanted  in  exchange. 

The  blockade,  therefore,  was  to  cut  off  the  trade  and  supplies 
of  the  South,  and  so  weaken  her.  But  as  England,  a  great  com 
mercial  nation,  wanted  her  cotton,  it  was  certain  that  unless 
the  blockade  were  rigorous  and  close,  cotton  would  be  smuggled 
out  and  supplies  sent  in. 

456.  Blockade  Runners.  —  This   is   just   what   did   happen. 
The  blockade  in  the  course  of  a  year  was  made  close,  by  ships 
stationed  off  the  ports,  sounds,  and  harbors.     In  some  places 
the  hulks  of  old  whalers  were  loaded  with  stone  and  sunk  in 
the  channels,  and  to  get  in  or  out  became  more  difficult.     As  a 
result  the  price  of  cotton  fell  to  eight  cents  a  pound  in  the  South 
(because  there  was  nobody  to  buy  it)  and  rose  to  fifty  cents  a 
pound  in  England  (because  so  little  was  to  be  had).     Then 
"  running  the  blockade  "  became  a  regular  business.   Goods  of  all 
sorts  were  brought  from  England  to  Nassau  in  the  West  Indies, 
where  they  would  be  put  on  board  of  vessels  built  to  run  the 
blockade.     These  blockade  runners  were  long,  low  steam  vessels 
which  drew  only  a  few  feet  of  water  and  had  great  speed. 
Their  hulls  were  but  a  few  feet  out  of  water  and  were  painted 


412      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

a  dull  gray.  Their  smokestacks  could  be  lowered  to  the  deck, 
and  they  burned  anthracite  coal,  which  made  no  smoke.  They 
would  leave  Nassau  at  such  a  time  as  would  enable  them  to 
be  off  Wilmington,  N.C.,  or  some  other  Southern  port,  on  a 
moonless  night  with  a  high  tide,  and  then,  making  a  dash, 
would  run  through  the  blockading  vessels.  Once  in  port,  they 
would  take  a  cargo  of  cotton,  and  would  run  out  on  a  dark 
night  or  during  a  storm.  During  the  war,  1504  vessels  of 
all  kinds  were  captured  or  destroyed.1 

457.  The  Commerce  Destroyers.  —  While  the  North  was  thus 
busy  destroying  the  trade  of  the  South,  the  South  was  busy 
destroying  the  enormous  trade  of  the  North.     When  the  war 
opened,  our  merchant  ships  were  to  be  seen  in  every  port  of 
the  world,  and  against  these  were  sent  a  class  of  armed  vessels 
known  as  "commerce  destroyers,"  whose  business  it  was  to 
cruise  along  the  great  highways  of  ocean  commerce,  keep  a 
sharp  lookout  for  our  merchantmen,  and  burn  all  they  could 
find.     The  first  of  these  commerce  destroyers  to  get  to  sea  was 
the  Sumter,  which  rail  the  blockade  at  the  mouth  of  the  Missis 
sippi   in   June,  1861,  and   within   a  week   had   taken   seven 
merchantmen.     So  important  was  it  to  capture  her  that  seven 
cruisers  were  sent  in  pursuit.     But  she  escaped  them  all  till 
January,  18G2,  when  she  was  shut  up  in  the  port  of  Gibraltar 
and  was  sold  to  prevent  capture. 

458.  The  Trent  Affair,   1861. — One  of  the  vessels  sent  in 
pursuit  of  the  Sumter  was  the  San  Jacinto,  commanded  by 
Captain  Wilkes.     While  at  Havana,  he  heard  that  two  com 
missioners  of  the  Confederate  government,  James  M.  Mason 
and  John  Slidell,  sent  out  as  commissioners  to  Great  Britain 
and  France,  were  to  sail  for  England  in  the  British  mail  steamer 
Trent;  and,  deciding  to  capture  them,  he  took  his  station  in  the 
Bermuda  Channel,  and  (November  8,  1861)  as  the  Trent  came 
steaming  along,  he  stopped  and  boarded  her,  and  carried  off 
Mason  and  Slidell  and  their  secretaries.     This  he  had  no  right 
to  do.     It  was  exactly  the  sort  of  thing  the  United  States  had 

1  Read  T.  E.  Taylor's  Running  the  Blockade,  pp.  16-32,  44-54. 


WAR   ALONG  THE   COAST   AND  ON  THE   SEA         413 

protested  against  ever  since  1790,  and  had  been  one  of  the 
causes  of  war  with  Great  Britain  in  1812.  The  commissioners 
were  therefore  released,  placed  on  board  another  English 
vessel,  and  taken  to  England.  The  conduct  of  Great  Britain 
in  this  matter  was  most  insulting  and  warlike,  and  nothing 
but  the  justice  of  her  demand  prevented  war.1 

459.  The  Famous  Cruisers  Florida,  Alabama,  Shenandoah.  — 
The  loss  of  the  Sumter  was  soon  made  good  by  the  appearance 
on  the  sea  of  a  fleet  of  commerce  destroyers  all  built  and  pur 
chased  in  England  with  the  full  knowledge  of  the  English 
government.  The  first  of  these,  the  Florida,  was  built  at 
Liverpool,  was  armed  at  an  uninhabited  island  in  the  Bahamas, 
and  after  roving  the  sea  for  more  than  a  year  was  captured 
by  the  United  States  cruiser  Wachusett  in  the  neutral  harbor 
of  Bahia  in  Brazil.  Her  capture  was  a  shameful  violation  of 
neutral  waters,  and  it  was  ordered  that  she  be  returned  to 
Brazil ;  but  she  was  sunk  by  "  an  unforeseen  accident "  in  Hamp 
ton  Roads.2 

The  next  to  get  afloat  was  the  Alabama.  She  was  built  at 
Liverpool  with  the  knowledge  of  the  English  government,  and 
became  in  time  one  of  the  most  famous  and  successful  of  all  the 
commerce  destroyers.  During  two  years  she  cruised  unharmed 
in  the  North  Atlantic,  in  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  in  the  Caribbean 
Sea,  along  the  coast  of  South  America,  and  even  in  the  Indian 
Ocean,  destroying  in  her  career  sixty-six  merchant  vessels.  At 
last  she  was  found  in  the  harbor  of  Cherbourg  (France)  by 
the  Kearsarge,  to  which  Captain  Semmes  of  the  Alabama  sent 
a  challenge  to  fight.  Captain  Winslow  accepted  it ;  and  June 
19,  1864,  after  a  short  and  gallant  engagement,  the  Alabama 
was  sunk  in  the  English  Channel.3 

The  Shenandoah,  another  cruiser,  was  purchased  in  England 

1  Harris's  The  Trent  Affair. 

2  Bullock's  Secret  Service  of  the  Confederate  States  in  Europe,  Vol.  I., 
pp.  152-224. 

8  Ibid,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  225-294.  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War, 
Vol.  IV.,  pp.  600-625. 

McM.  HIST. —23 


414 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


and  armed  at  a  barren  island  near  Madeira.  Thence  she  went 
to  Australia,  and  cruising  northward  in  the  Pacific  to  Bering 
Strait,  destroyed  the  China-bound  clippers  and  the  whaling 
fleet.  At  last,  hearing  of  the  downfall  of  the  Confederacy,  she 
went  back  to  England.1 

460.  The  Ironclads.  —  To  blockade  the  coast  and  cut  off 
trade  was  most  important,  but  not  all  that  was  needed.  Here 
and  there  were  seaports  which  must  be  captured  and  forts 
which  must  be  destroyed,  bays  and  sounds,  and  great  rivers 

coming  down  from  the 
interior,  which  it  was 
very  desirable  to  secure 
control  of.  The  Confed- 


Remodeling  the  Merrimac 

erates  were  fully  aware  of 

this,  and  as  soon  as  they  The  n  g  gteamer  Merrimac 

could,  placed  on  the  waters 

of  their  rivers  and  harbors  vessels  new  to  naval  warfare,  called 

ironclad  rams.     These  were  steamboats  cut  down  and  made 

suitable  for  naval  purposes,  and  then  covered  over  with  iron 

rails  or  thick  iron  plates.     The  most  famous  of  them  was  the 

Merrimac. 

461.  The  Merrimac  or  Virginia.  —  When  Sumter  was  fired 
on  and  the  war  began,  the  United  States  held  the  great  navy 
yard  and  naval  depot  at  Portsmouth,  Va.,  where  were  eleven 
war  vessels  of  various  sorts,  and  immense  quantities  of  guns 
and  stores  and  ammunition.  But  the  officer  in  charge,  know- 

1  Bullock's  Secret  Service  of  the  Confederate  States  in  Europe,  Vol.  II., 
pp.  131-103. 


WAR  ALONG  THE  COAST  AND  ON  THE   SEA        415 


ing  that  Virginia  was  about  to  secede,  and  fearing  that  the  yard 
would  be  seized  by  the  Confederates,  sank  most  of  the  ships, 
set  fire  to  the  buildings,  and  abandoned  the  place.  The  Con 
federates  at  once  took  possession,  raised  the  vessels,  and  out  of 
one  of  them,  a  steamer  called  the  Merrimac,  made  an  ironclad 
ram,  which  they  renamed  the  Virginia  and  sent  forth  to  de 
stroy  the  wooden  vessels  of  the  United  States  then  assembled  in 
Chesapeake  Bay. 

Well  knowing  that  he  could  not  be  harmed  by  any  of  our 
war  ships,  the  commander  of  the  Merrimac  went  leisurely  to 
work  and  began  (March  8,  1862)  by  attacking  the  Cumberland. 
In  her  day  the  Cumberland  had  been  as  fine  a  frigate  as  ever 
went  to  sea;  but  the  days  of  wooden  ships  were  gone,  and  she 
was  powerless.  Her  shot  glanced  from  the  sides  of  the  Merri 
mac  like  so  many  peas,  while  the  new  monster,  coming  on  under 
steam,  rammed  her  in  the  side  and  made  a  great  hole  through 
which  the  water  poured.  Even  then  the  commander  of  the 

Cumberland  would  not  surrender,  but  fought  his  ship  till  she 
filled  and  sank  with  her  guns  booming  and  her  flag  flying. 
After  sinking  the  Cumberland,  the  Merrimac  attacked  the 

Congress,  forced  her  to  surrender,  set  her  on  fire,  and,  as 
darkness  was  then  coming  on,  went  back  to  the  shelter  of 
the  Confederate  batteries. 

462.   The    Monitor.  —  Early   the    next    day   the    Merrimac 

sailed  forth  to  finish  the  work  of  destruction,  and  picking  out 

the  Minnesota,  which  was 

hard  and  fast  in  the  mud, 

bore  down  to  attack  her. 

When  lo !  from  beside  the 

Minnesota    started    forth 

the  most   curious-looking 

craft  ever  seen  on  water. 

It  was  the  famous  Moni 
tor,  designed  by  Captain 


Monitor,  side  and  deck  plan 


John  Ericsson,  to  whose  inventive  genius  we  owe  the  screw 
propeller  and  the  hot-air  engine.    She  consisted  of  a  small  iron 


416 


THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 


hull,  on  top  of  which  rested  a  boat-shaped  raft  covered  with 
sheets  of  iron  which  made  the  deck.  On  top  of  the  deck,  which 
was  about  three  feet  above  the  water,  was  an  iron  cylinder,  or 
turret,  which  revolved  by  machinery  and  carried  two  guns. 
She  looked,  it  was  said,  like  "  a  cheesebox  mounted  on  a  raft." 


The  Monitor  was  built  at 
New  York,  and  was  intended 
for  harbor  defense ;  but  the 
fact  that  the  Confederates 
were  building  a  great  iron 
clad  at  Norfolk  made  it  necessary  to  send  her  to  Hampton 
Eoads.  The  sea  voyage  was  a  dreadful  one ;  again  and  again 
she  was  almost  wrecked,  but  she  weathered  the  storm,  and 
early  on  the  evening  of  March  8,  1862,  entered  Hampton 
Roads,  to  see  the  waters  lighted  up  by  the  burning  Congress 
and  to  hear  of  the  sinking  of  the  Cumberland.  Taking  hei 


WAR  ALONG  THE  COAST  AND  ON  THE  SEA 


417 


place  beside  the  Minnesota,  she  waited  for  the  dawn,  and  about 
eight  o'clock  saw  the  Merrimac  coming  toward  her,  and,  start 
ing  out,  began  the  greatest  naval  battle  of  modern  times. 
When  it  ended,  neither  ship  was  disabled;  but  they  were  the 
masters  of  the  seas,  for  it  was  now  proved  that  no  wooden 
ships  anywhere  afloat  could  harm  them.  The  days  of  wooden 
naval  vessels  were  over,  and  all  the  nations  of  the  world  were 


An  encounter  at  close  range 

forced  to  build  their  navies  anew.  The  Merrimac  withdrew 
from  the  fight ;  when  the  Confederates  evacuated  Norfolk,  they 
destroyed  her  (May,  1862).  The  Monitor  sank  in  a  storm  at 
sea  while  going  to  Beaufort,  N.C.  (January,  1863).1 

463.  Capture  of  the  Coast  Forts  and  Waterways.  —  Operations 
along  the  coast  were  begun  in  August,  1861,  by  the  capture 
of  the  forts  at  the  mouth  of  Hatteras  Inlet,  N.C. ,.  the  en 
trance  to  Pamlico  Sound ;  and  by  the  capture  of  Port  Royal 
in  November.  A  few  months  later  (early  in  1862)  control  of 
1  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I.,  pp.  719-750. 


418      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

Pamlico  and  Albemarle  sounds  was  secured  by  the  capture  of 
Roanoke  Island,  Elizabeth  City,  and  Newbern,  all  in  North 
Carolina,  and  of  Fort  Macon,  which  guarded  the  entrance  to 
Beaufort  harbor.  McClellan's  capture  of  Yorktown  in  May, 
1862,  was  soon  followed  by  the  hasty  evacuation  of  Norfolk  by 
the  Confederate  forces,  so  that  at  the  end  of  the  first  year  of 
the  war  most  of  the  seacoast  from  Norfolk  to  the  Gulf  was 
in  Union  hands. 

Along  the  Gulf  coast  naval  operations  resulted  in  opening 
the  lower  Mississippi  and  capturing  New  Orleans  in  April 
(p.  392),  and  Pensacola  in  May,  1862. 

In  April,  1863,  a  naval  attack  on  Charleston  was  planned,  but 
was  carried  no  farther  than  a  severe  battering  of  Fort  Sumter. 
In  August,  1864,  Admiral  Farragut  led  his  fleet  past  Forts 
Morgan  and  Gaines,  that  guarded  the  entrance  of  Mobile  Bay, 
captured  the  Confederate  fleet  and  took  the  forts.  Mobile, 
however,  was  not  taken  till  April,  1865,  just  as  the  Confederacy 
reached  its  end.  Fort  Fisher,  which  commanded  the  entrance 
to  Cape  Fear  River,  on  which  stood  Wilmington,  the  great 
port  of  entry  for  blockade  runners,  fell  before  the  attack  of  a 
combined  land  and  naval  force  in  January,  1865. 

i 
SUMMARY 

1.  The  naval  operations  of  the  war  opened  with  the  blockade  of  the 

coast  of  the  Confederate  States. 

2.  This  was  necessary  in  order  to  prevent  cotton,  sugar,  and  tobacco 

being  sent  abroad  in  return  for  materials  of  war. 

3.  As  a  result  blockade  running  was  carried  on  to  a  great  extent. 

4.  In  order  to  destroy  our  commerce  a  fleet  of  cruisers  was  built  in  Eng 

land,  purchased  and  manned  by  the  Confederate  government.    They 
inflicted  very  serious  damage. 

5.  But  the  great  event  of  the  war  was  the  battle  between  the  ironclads 

Monitor  and    Merrimac,   which   marked  the  advent  of  the  iron- 
armored  war  ship. 


CHAPTER   XXIX 

THE    COST    OF  THE   WAR 

464.  The  Cost  in  Money.  —  When  Fort  Sumter  was  fired  on 
in  1861  and  Lincoln  made  his  call  for  volunteers,  the  national 
debt  was  §90,000,000,  the  annual  revenue  was  §41,000,000, 
and  the  annual  expenses  of  the  government  $66,000,000.     As 
the  expenses  were  vastly  increased  by  the  outbreak  of  war,  it 
became  necessary  to  get  more  money.     To  do  this,  Congress, 
when  it  met  in  July,  1861,  began  a  financial  policy  which  must 
be  described  if  we  are  to  understand  the  later  history  of  our 
country. 

465.  Power  to  raise  Money.  —  The  Constitution  gives  Con 
gress  power 

1.  "  To  lay  and  collect  taxes,  duties,  imposts,  and  excises." 

2.  "  To  borrow  money  on  the  credit  of  the  United  States." 

3.  To  apportion  direct  taxes  among  the  several  states  according 

to  their  population. 

466.  Raising  Money  by  Taxation ;  Internal  Revenue.  —  Exer 
cising  these  powers,  Congress  in  1861  increased  the  duties  on 
articles  imported,  laid  a  direct  tax  of  §20,000,000,  and  imposed 
a  tax  of  three  per  cent  on  all  incomes  over  §800.     The  returns 
were  large,  but  they  fell  far  short  of  the  needs  of  the  govern 
ment,  and  in  1862  an  internal  revenue  system  was  created. 
Taxes  were  now  imposed  on  spirits  and  malt  liquors ;  on  manu 
factured  tobacco ;  on  trades,  professions,  and  occupations ;  till 
almost  everything  a  man  ate,  drank,  wore,  bought,  sold,  or 
owned  was  taxed.     The  revenue  collected  from  such  sources 
between  1862  and  1865  was  §780,000,000. 

419 


420      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

467.  Raising  Money  "  on  the  Credit  of  the  United  States."  — 
Money  raised  by  internal  revenue  and  the  tariff  was  largely 
used  to  pay  current  expenses  and  the  interest  on  the  national 
debt.     The  great  war  expenses  were  met  by  borrowing  money 
in  two  ways : 

1.  By  selling  bonds. 

2.  By  issuing  "  United  States  notes." 

468.  The  Bonded  and  Interest-paying  Debt.  —  The  bonds  were 
obligations  by  which  the  government  bound  itself  to  pay  the 
holder  the  sum  of  money  specified  in  the  bond  at  the  end  of  a 
certain  period  of  years,  as  twenty  or  thirty  or  forty.     Mean 
time  the  holder  was  to  be  paid  interest  at  the  rate  of  five, 
six,  or  seven  per  cent  a  year.      Between  July  1,   1861,  and 
August    31,    1865,    when    our    national    debt    was    greatest, 
'$1,109,000,000  worth  of  bonds  had  been  sold  to  the  people 
and  the  money  used  for  war  purposes. 

469.  United  States  Notes.  —  The  United  States  notes  were  of 
two  kinds :   those  which  bore  interest,  and  those  which  did  not. 
Those  bearing   interest   passed  under  various  names,  and  by 
1866  amounted  to  $577,000,000. 

United  States  notes  bearing  no  interest  were  the  "  old  de 
mand  notes,"  the  "greenbacks,"  the  "fractional  currency," 
and  the  "national  bank  notes." 

The  greenbacks  (a  name  given  them  from  the  green  color 
of  their  backs)  were  authorized  early  in  1862,  were  in  denomi 
nations  from  $1  up,  bore  no  interest,  were  legal  tender  in 
payment  of  all  debts,  public  and  private,  except  duties  on 
imports  and  interest  on  the  public  debt.  In  time  $450,000,000 
were  authorized  to  be  issued,  and  in  1864,  $449,000,000  were 
in  circulation. 

470.  Fractional  Currency.  —  The  issue  of  the  demand  notes 
in  1861,  and  the   fact,  apparent  to  every  one,  that  Congress 
must  keep  on  issuing  paper  money,  led  the  state  banks  to  sus 
pend  specie  payment  in  December,  1861.     As  a  consequence, 
the  3,  5,  10,  25,  and  50  cent  silver  pieces  (and  of  course  all 


THE   COST   OF   THE   WAR  421 

the  gold)  disappeared  from  circulation.  This  left  the  people 
without  small  change,  and  for  a  time  they  were  forced  to  pay 
their  car  fare  and  buy  their  newspapers  and  make  change  with 
postage  stamps  and  "token  "  pieces  of  brass  and  copper,  which 
passed  from  hand  to  hand  as  cents.  Indeed,  one  act  of  Con 
gress,  in  July,  1862,  made  it  lawful  to  receive  postage* stamps 
(in  sums  under  $5)  in  payment  of  government  dues.  But 
in  March,  1863,  another  step  was  taken,  and  an  issue  of 
$50,000,000  in  paper  fractional  currency  was  authorized. 

471.  The  National  Banking  System.  —  Yet  another  financial 
measure  to  aid  the  government  was  the  creation  of  national 
banks.     In  1863  Congress  established  the  office  of  "Comp 
troller  of  the  Currency,"  and  authorized  him  to  permit  the 
establishment  of  banking  associations.     Each  must  consist  of 
not  less  than  five  persons,  must  have  a  certain  capital,  and 
must  deposit  with  the  Treasury  Department  at  Washington 
government  bonds  equal  to  at  least  one  third  of  its  capital. 
The  Comptroller  was  then  to  issue  to  each  association  bank 
notes  not  exceeding  in  value  ninety  per  cent  of  the  face  value 
of  the  bonds.     It  was  supposed  that  the  state  banks,  which 
then  issued  $150,000,000  in  7000  kinds  of  bank  notes,  would 
take  advantage  of  the  law,  become  national  banks,  and  use 
this  national   money,  which  would  pass  all  over  the  coun 
try.     This  would  enable  the  government  to  sell  the   banks 
1150,000,000  and  more  of  bonds.     But  the  state  banks  did 
not  do  so  till  1865,  when  a  tax  of  ten  per  cent  was  laid  on 
the  amount  of  paper  money  each  state  bank  issued.     Then,  to 
get  rid  of  the  tax,  hundreds  of  them  bought  bonds  and  be 
came  national  banks. 

472.  The  National  Debt   and   State   Expenditures.  —  On  the 
31st  of  August,  1865,  the  national  debt  thus  created  reached 
its  highest  figure,  and  was  in  round  numbers  $2,845,000,000. 

Besides  the  debt  incurred  by  the  national  government,  there 
were  heavy  expenditures  by  the  states,  and  we  might  say  by 
almost  every  city  and  town,  amounting  to  $468,000,000. 
But  even  when  the  war  ended,  the  outlay  on  account  of 


422  THE  LONG  'STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

the  war  did  not  cease.  Each  year  there  was  interest  to  pay 
on  the  bonded  debt,  and  pensions  to  be  given  to  disabled 
soldiers  and  sailors,  and  to  the  widows  and  orphans  of  men 
killed,  and  claims  for  damages  of  all  sorts  to  be  allowed. 
Between  July  1,  1861,  and  June  30,  1879,  the  expenditure 
of  the  government  growing  out  of  the  war  amounted  to 
$6,190,000,000. 

Many  men  who  served  in  the  army  made  great  personal 
sacrifices.  They  were  taken  away  from  some  useful  employ 
ment,  from  their  farms,  their  trades,  their  business,  or  their 
professions.  What  they  might  have  earned  or  accomplished 
during  the  time  of  service  was  so  much  loss. 

473.  The  Cost  in  Human  Life.  —  While  the  war  was  raging, 
Lincoln  made  twelve  calls  for  volunteers,  to  serve  for  periods 
varying  from  100  days  to  three  years.  The  first  was  the 
famous  call  of  April  15,  1861,  for  75,000  three-months  men; 
the  last  was  in  December,  1864.  When  the  numbers  of 
soldiers  thus  summoned  from  their  homes  are  added,  we  find 
that  2,763,670  were  wanted  and  2,772,408  responded.  This 
does  not  mean  that  2,770,000  different  men  were  called  into 
service  or  were  ever  at  any  one  time  under  arms.  Some 
served  for  three  months,  others  for  six  months,  a  year,  or 
three  years.  Very  often  a  man  would  enlist  and  when 
his  term  was  out  would  reenlist.  The  largest  number  in  ser 
vice  at  any  time  was  in  April,  1865.  It  was  1,000,516,  of 
whom  650,000  were  fit  for  service.  In  1865,  800,000  were 
mustered  out  between  April  and  October. 

Of  those  who  gave  their  lives  to  preserve  the  Union,  67,000 
were  killed  in  battle,  43,000  died  of  wounds,  and  230,000  of 
disease  and  other  causes.  In  round  numbers,  360,000  men 
gave  up  their  lives  in  defense  of  the  Union.  How  many 
perished  in  the  Confederate  army  cannot  be  stated,  but  the 
loss  was  quite  as  large  as  on  the  Union  side ;  so  that  it  is  safe 
to  say  that  more  than  700,000  men  were  killed  in  the  war.1 

1  A  table  giving  the  size  of  the  armies  and  the  loss  of  life  will  be  found 
in  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  767-768. 


THE   COST  OF  THE   WAR  423 

474.  Suffering  in  the  South.  —  The  South  raised  all  the  cot 
ton,  nearly  all  the  rice  and  tobacco,  and  one  third  of  the  Indian 
corn  grown  in  our  country,  and  depended  on  Europe  and  the 
North  for  manufactured  goods.     But  when  the  North,  in  1861 
and  1862,  blockaded  her  ports  and  cut  off  these  supplies,  her 
distress  began.    Brass  bells  and  brass  kettles  were  called  for  to 
"be  melted  and  cast  into  cannon,  and  every  sort  of  fowling  piece 
and  old  musket  was  pressed  into  service  and  sent  to  the  troops 
in  the  field.     As  money  could  not  be  had,  treasury  notes  were 
issued  by  the  million,  to  be  redeemed  "  six  months  after  the 
close  of  the  war."     Planters  were  next  pledged  to  loan  the 
government  a  share  of  the  proceeds  of  their  cotton,  receiving 
bonds  in  return.     But  the  blockade  was  so  rigorous  that  very 
little  cotton  could  get  to  Europe.     When  this  failed,  provi 
sions  for  the  army  were  bought  with  bonds  and  with  paper 
money  issued  by  the  states. 

This  steady  issue  of  paper  money,  with  nothing  to  redeem 
it,  led  to  its  rapid  decrease  in  value.  In  1864  it  took  $40  in 
Confederate  paper  money  to  buy  a  yard  of  calico.  A  spool  of 
thread  cost  $20;  a  ham,  $150;  a  pound  of  sugar,  $75;  and  a 
barrel  of  flour,  $1200. 

475.  Makeshifts.  —  Thrown    on   their   own    resources,    the 
Southern    people   became   home    manufacturers.      The   inner 
shuck  of  Indian  corn  was  made  into  hats.     Knitting  became 
fashionable.     Homespun  clothing,   dyed  with  the  extract  of 
black-walnut  bark  or  wild  indigo  or  swamp  maple  or  elder 
berries,  was  worn  by  everybody.     Barrels  and  boxes  which 
had  been  used  for  packing  salt  fish  and  pork  were  soaked  in 
water,  which  was  evaporated  for  the  sake  of  the  salt  thus 
extracted.     Eye  or  wheat  roasted  and  ground  became  a  sub 
stitute  for  coffee,  and  dried  raspberry  leaves  for  tea. 

Quite  as  desperate  were  the  shifts  to  which  the  South  was 
put  for  soldiers.  At  first  every  young  man  was  eager  to  rush 
to  the  front.  But  as  time  passed,  and  the  great  armies  of  the 
North  were  formed,  it  became  necessary  to  force  men  into  the 
ranks,  to  "conscript"  them;  and  in  1862  an  act  of  the  Con- 


424      THE  LONG  STRUGGLE  WITH  SLAVERY 

federate  Congress  made  all  males  from  eighteen  to  thirty-five 
subject  to  military  duty.  In  September,  1862,  all  men  from 
eighteen  to  forty-five,  and  later  from  sixteen  to  sixty,  were 
subject  to  conscription.  The  slaves,  of  course,  worked  on  the 
fortifications,  drove  teams,  and  cooked  for  the  troops. 

476.  Cost  to  the  South.  —  Thus  drained  of  her  able-bodied 
population,  the  South  went  rapidly  to  rack  and  ruin.  Crops 
fell  off,  property  fell  into  decay,  business  stopped,  railroads 
were  ruined  because  men  could  not  be  had  to  keep  them  in 
repair,  and  because  no  rails  could  be  obtained.  The  loss  in 
flicted  by  this  general  and  widespread  ruin  can  never  be  even 
estimated.  Cotton,  houses,  property  of  every  sort,  was  de 
stroyed  to  prevent  capture  by  the  Union  forces.  On  every 
battlefield  incalculable  damage  was  done  to  woods,  villages, 
farmhouses,  and  crops.  Bridges  were  burned ;  cities,  such  as 
Kichmond,  Atlanta,  Columbia,  Charleston,  were  well-nigh  de 
stroyed  by  fire;  thousands  of  miles  of  railroad  were  torn  up  and 
ruined.  The  loss  entailed  by  the  emancipation  of  the  slaves, 
supposing  each  negro  worth  $500,  amounts  to  $2,000,000,000. 

SUMMARY 

1.  When  the  war  opened,  and  the  army  and  navy  were  called  into  the 

field,  Congress  proceeded  to  raise  money  by  three  methods :  A.  In 
creasing  taxation.  B.  Issuing  bonds.  C.  -Issuing  paper  money. 

2.  Taxation  was  in  three  forms  :  A.  Direct  tax.    B.  Tariff  duties.    C.  In 

ternal  revenue,  which  included  a  vast  number  of  taxes. 

3.  Paper  money  consisted  of  treasury  notes,  United  States  notes  (green 

backs),  fractional  currency. 

4.  Besides  the  cost  to  the  nation,  there  was  the  cost  to  the  states,  counties, 

cities,  and  towns  for  bounties,  and  in  aid  of  the  war  in  general ;  and 
the  cost  to  individuals. 

6.  There  is  again  the  cost  produced  by  the  war  and  still  being  paid  as 
pensions,  care  of  national  cemeteries,  etc.,  and  interest  on  the  pub 
lic  debt. 

6.  The  cost  in  human  life  was  great  to  both  North  and  South  ;  there  was 
also  a  destruction  of  property  and  business,  the  money  value  of 
which  cannot  be  estimated. 


'THE  INDESTRUCTIBLE   UNION  OF  INDESTRUC 
TIBLE  STATES." 

CHAPTER   XXX 

RECONSTRUCTION   OF  THE   SOUTH 

477  The  Reelection  of  Lincoln.  —  While  the  war  was  still 
raging,  the  time  came,  in  1864,  for  the  nomination  of  candi- 
lates  for  the  Presidency  and  Vice  Presidency.  The  situation 
was  serious,  On  the  one  hand  was  the  Democratic  party, 
lenouncing  Mr.  Lincoln,  insisting  that  the  war  was  a  failure, 
md  demanding  peace  at  any  price.  On  the  other  hand  was  a 
Large  faction  of  the  Kepublican  party,  finding  fault  with  Mr. 
Lincoln  because  he  was  not  severe  enough,  because  he  had 
done  things  they  thought  the  Constitution  did  not  permit  him 
to  do,  and  because  he  had  fixed  the  conditions  on  which  people 
in  the  so-called  seceding  states  might  send  representatives 
and  senators  to  Congress.  Between  these  two  was  a  party 
made  up  of  Republicans  and  of  war  Democrats,  who  insisted 
that  the  Union  must  be  preserved  at  all  costs.  These  men 
held  a  convention,  and  dropping  the  name  "Republicans" 
for  the  time  being,  took  that  of  "National  Union  party,"  and 
renominated  Lincoln.  For  Vice  President  they  selected  An 
drew  Johnson,  a  Union  man  and  war  Democrat  from  Ten 
nessee. 

The  dissatisfied  or  Radical  Republicans  held  a  convention 
and  nominated  John  C.  Fremont  and  General  John  Cochrane. 
They  demanded  one  term  for  a  President;  the  confiscation  of 
the  land  of  rebels ;  the  reconstruction  of  rebellious  states  by 

425 


426  "THE   INDESTRUCTIBLE   UNION" 

Congress,  not  by  the  President;  vigorous  war  measures;  and 
the  destruction  of  slavery  forever. 

The  Democrats  nominated  General  George  B.  McClellan  and 
George  H.  Pendleton.  The  platform  demanded  "  a  cessation 
of  hostilities  with  a  view  to  a  convention  of  the  states,"  and 
described  the  sacrifice  of  lives  and  treasure  in  behalf  of  Union 
as  "  four  years  of  failure  to  restore  the  Union  by  the  experi 
ment  of  war."  McClellan,  in  his  letter  of  acceptance,  repudi 
ated  both  of  these  sentiments.  The  platform  called  for  peace 
first,  and  then  union  if  possible.  McClellan  said  union  first, 
and  then  peace.  "  No  peace  can  be  permanent  without  union." 
The  platform  said  the  war  was  a  failure.  McClellan  said,  <k  I 
could  not  look  in  the  faces  of  my  gallant  comrades  of  the 
army  and  navy  .  .  .  and  tell  them  that  their  labors  and  the 
sacrifice  of  so  many  of  our  slain  and  wounded  brethren  had 
been  in  vain." 

The  result  was  never  in  doubt.  By  September  Fremont  and 
Cochrane  both  withdrew,  and  in  November  Lincoln  and  John 
son  were  elected,  and  on  March  4,  1865,  were  sworn  into  office. 

478.  The  Murder  of  Lincoln.  —  By  that  time  the  Confederacy 
was  doomed.  Sherman  had  made  his  march  to  the  sea; 
Savannah  and  Charleston  were  in  Union  hands,  and  Lee  hard 
pressed  at  Eichmond.  April  9  he  surrendered,  and  on  April 
14, 1865,  the  fourth  anniversary  of  the  evacuation  of  Fort  Sumter, 
Anderson,  now  a  major  general,  visited  the  fort  which  he  had 
so  gallantly  defended,  and  in  the  presence  of  the  army  and 
navy  raised  the  tattered  flag  he  pulled  down  in  1861. 

That  night  Lincoln  went  to  Ford's  Theater  in  Washington, 
and  while  he  was  sitting  quietly  in  his  box,  an  actor  named 
John  Wilkes  Booth  came  in  and  shot  him  through  the  head, 
causing  a  wound  from  which  the  President  died  early  next 
morning.  His  deed  done,  the  assassin  leaped  from  the  box  to 
the  stage,  and  shouting,  "  Sic  semper  tyrannis  "  (So  be  it  al 
ways  to  tyrants),  the  motto  of  Virginia,  made  his  escape  in 
the  confusion  of  the  moment,  and  mounting  a  horse,  rode  away. 

The  act  of  Booth  was  one  result  of  a  conspiracy,  the  details 


RECONSTRUCTION  OF   THE   SOUTH  427 

of  which  were  soon  discovered  and  the  criminals  punished. 
Booth  was  hunted  by  soldiers  and  shot  in  a  barn  in  Virginia. 
His  accomplices  were  either  hanged  or  imprisoned  for  life.1 

479.  Andrew  Johnson,    President.  —  Lincoln   had   not   been 
many  hours  dead  when  Andrew  Johnson,  as  the  Constitution 
provides,  took  the  oath  of  office  and  became 

President  of  the  United  States.  Before  him 
lay  the  most  gigantic  task  ever  given  to  any 
President. 

480.  Reconstruction.  —  To   dispose   of    the 
Confederate  soldiers  and  politicians  was  an 
easy  matter;  but  to  decide  what  to  do  with 
the  Confederate  states  proved  most  difficult. 
Lincoln  had  always  held  that  they  could  not 

secede.      If  they  could  not  secede,  they  had 

J  .  J  Andrew  Johnson 

never  been  out  of   the  Union,  and  if  they 

had  never  been  out  of  the  Union,  they  were  entitled,  as  of  old, 

to  send  senators  and  representatives  to  Congress. 

But  whether  the  states  had  or  had  not  seceded,  the  old  state 
governments  of  1861,  and  the  relations  these  governments  once 
held  with  the  Union,  were  destroyed  by  the  so-called  secession, 
and  it  was  necessary  to  define  some  way  by  which  they  might 
be  reestablished,  or,  as  it  was  called,  "  reconstructed." 

Toward  the  end  of  1863,  accordingly,  when  the  Union  army 
had  acquired  possession  of  Tennessee,  Arkansas,  and  Louisi 
ana,  Lincoln  issued  his  "  Amnesty  Proclamation "  and  began 
the  work  of  reconstruction.  He  promised,  in  the  first  place, 
that,  with  certain  exceptions,  which  he  mentioned,  he  would 
pardon2  every  man  who  should  lay  down  his  arms  and  swear  to 
support  and  obey  the  Constitution,  and  the  Emancipation  Proc 
lamation.  He  promised,  in  the  second  place,  that  whenever,  in 
any  state  that  had  attempted  secession,  voters  equal  in  num- 

1  The  best  account  of  the  murder  of  Lincoln  is  given  in  "  Four  Lincoln 
Conspiracies"  in  the  Century  Magazine  for  April,  1896. 

2  The  Constitution  gives  the  President  power  to  pardon  all  offenses 
against  the  United  States,  except  in  cases  of  impeachment. 


428  "THE   INDESTRUCTIBLE   UNION*' 

ber  to  one  tenth  of  those  who  in  1860  voted  for  presidential 
electors,  should  take  this  oath  and  organize  a,  state  govern 
ment,  he  would  recognize  it;  that  is,  he  would  consider  the 
state  "  reconstructed,"  loyal,  and  entitled  to  representation  in 
Congress. 

Following  out  this  plan,  the  people  of  Arkansas,  Tennessee, 
and  Louisiana  made  reconstructed  state  governments  which 
Lincoln  recognized.  But  here  Congress  stepped  in,  refused  to 
seat  the  senators  from  these  states,  and  made  a  plan  of  its 
own,  which  Lincoln  vetoed. 

481.  Johnson's  "  My  Policy  "  Plan  of  Reconstruction.  —  So  the 
matter  stood  when  Lee  and  Johnston  surrendered,  when  Davis 
was  captured,  and  the  Confederacy  fell  to  pieces.  All  the  laws 
enacted  by  the  Confederate  Congress  at  once  became  null  and 
void.  Taxes  were  no  longer  collected ;  letters  were  no  longer 
delivered;  Confederate  money  had  no  longer  any  value.  Even 
the  state  governments  ceased  to  have  any  authority.  Bands 
of  Union  cavalry  scoured  the  country,  capturing  such  gov 
ernors,  political  leaders,  and  prominent  men  as  could  be  found, 
and  striking  terror  into  others  who  fled  to  places  of  safety.  In 
the  midst  of  this  confusion  all  civil  government  ended.  To 
reestablish  it  under  the  Constitution  and  laws  of  the  United 
States  was,  therefore,  the  first  duty  of  the  President,  and  he 
began  to  do  so  at  once.  First  he  raised  the  blockade,  and 
opened  the  ports  of  the  South  to  trade ;  then  he  ordered  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  the 
Postmaster-general,  the  Attorney-general,  to  see  that  the  taxes 
were  collected,  that  letters  were  delivered,  that  the  courts  of 
the  United  States  were  opened,  and  the  laws  enforced  in  all 
the  Southern  States;  finally,  he  placed  over  each  of  the  unre 
constructed  states  a  temporary  or  provisional  governor.  These 
governors  called  conventions  of  delegates  elected  by  such  white 
men  as  were  allowed  to  vote,  and  these  conventions  did  four 
things :  1.  They  declared  the  ordinances  of  secession  null  and 
void.  2.  They  repudiated  every  debt  incurred  in  supporting 
the  Confederacy,  and  promised  never  to  pay  one  of  them. 


RECONSTRUCTION  OF  THE   SOUTH  429 

3.  They  abolished  slavery  within  their  own  bounds.  4.  They 
ratified  the  Thirteenth  Amendment  to  the  Constitution,  which 
abolished  slavery  forever  in  the  United  States. 

482.  The   Thirteenth    Amendment. — This   amendment   was 
sent  out  to  the  states  by  Congress  in  February,  1865,  and  was 
necessary  to  complete  the  work  begun  by  the  Emancipation 
Proclamation.     That  proclamation  merely  set  free  the  slaves 
in  certain  parts  of  the  country,  and   left   the   right  to    buy 
more  untouched.     Again,  certain  slave  states  (Delaware,  Mary 
land,  West  Virginia,  Kentucky,  Missouri)   had  not  seceded, 
and   in   them   slavery   still   existed.     In   order,  therefore,  to 
abolish  the  institution  of  slavery  in  every  state  in  the  Union, 
an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  was  necessary,  as  many  of 
the  states  could  not  be  relied  on  to  abolish  it  within  their 
bounds  by  their  own  act.     The  amendment  was  formally  pro 
claimed  a  part  of  the  Constitution  on  December  18,  1865. l 

483.  Treatment  of  the  Freedmen  in  the  South.  —  Had  the  South 
ern  legislatures  stopped  here,  all  would  have  been  well.     But 
they  went  on,  and  passed  a  series  of  laws  concerning  vagrants, 
apprentices,  and  paupers,  which  kept  the  negroes  in  a  state  of 
involuntary  servitude,. if  not  in  actual  slavery. 

To  the  men  of  the  South,  who  feared  that  the  ignorant 
negroes  would  refuse  to  work,  these  laws  seemed  to  be  neces 
sary.  But  by  the  men  of  the  North  they  were  regarded  as 
signs  of  a  determination  on  the  part  of  Southern  men  not  to 
accept  the  abolition  of  slavery.  When,  therefore,  Congress 
met  in  December,  1865,  the  members  were  very  angry  because 
the  President  had  reconstructed  the  late  Confederate  states  in 
his  own  way  without  consulting  Congress,  and  because  these 
states  had  made  such  severe  laws  against  the  negroes. 

1  Before  an  amendment  proposed  by  Congress  can  become  a  part  of  the 
Constitution,  it  must  be  accepted  or  ratified  by  the  legislatures  of  three 
fourths  of  all  the  states.  In  1865  there  were  thirty-six  states  in  the 
Union,  and  of  these,  sixteen  free,  and  eleven  slave  states  ratified  the 
Thirteenth  Amendment,  and  so  made  it  part  of  the  Constitution.  When 
an  amendment  has  been  ratified  by  the  necessary  number  of  states,  the 
President  states  the  fact  in  a  proclamation. 
McM.  HIST.  — 24 


V 

430  "THE   INDESTRUCTIBLE   UNION" 

484.  Congressional    Plan    of   Reconstruction.  —  As    soon    as 
the  two  houses  were  organized,  the  President  and  his  work 
were  ignored,  the  senators  and  representatives  from  the  eleven 
states  that  had  seceded  were  refused  seats  in  Congress,  and  a 
series  of  acts  were  passed  to  protect  the  freedmen. 

One  of  these,  enacted  in  March,  1866,  was  the  "  Civil  Bights  " 
Bill,  which  gave  negroes  all  the  rights  of  citizenship  and  per 
mitted  them  to  sue  for  any  of  these  rights  (when  deprived  of 
them)  in  the  United  States  courts.  This  was  vetoed ;  but  Con 
gress  passed  the  bill  over  the  veto.  Now,  a  law  enacted  by 
one  Congress  can,  of  course,  be  repealed  by  another,  and  lest 
this  should  be  done,  and  the  freedmen  be  deprived  of  their 
civil  rights,  Congress  (June,  1866)  passed  the  Fourteenth 
Amendment  to  the  Constitution,  and  made  the  ratification  of  it 
by  the  Southern  States  a  condition  of  readmittance  to  Congress. 

Finally,  a  Freedmen's  Bureau  Bill,  ordering  the  sale  of 
government  land  to  negroes  on  easy  terms,  and  giving  them 
military  protection  for  their  rights,  was  passed  over  the  Presi 
dent's  veto,  just  before  Congress  adjourned. 

485.  The  President  abuses  Congress.  —  During  the  summer, 
Johnson  made  speeches  at  Western  cities,  in  which,  in  very 
coarse  language,  he  abused  Congress,  calling  it  a  Congress  of 
only  part  of  the  states ;  "  a  factious,  domineering,  tyrannical 
Congress,"  "a  Congress  violent  in  breaking  up  the  Union." 
These  attacks,  coupled  with  the  fact  that  some  of  the  Southern 
States,  encouraged  by  the  President's  conduct,  rejected  the  Four 
teenth  Amendment,  made  Congress,  when  it  met  in  December, 
1866,  more  determined  than  ever.     By  one  act  it  gave  negroes 
the  right  to  vote  in  the  territories  and  in  the  District  of  Colum 
bia.     By  another  it  compelled  the  President  to  issue  his  orders 
to  the  army  through  General  Grant,  for  Congress  feared  that 
he  would  recall  the  troops  stationed  in  the  South  to  protect 
the  freedmen.     But  the  two  important  acts  were  the  "  Tenure 
of  Office  Act"  and  "  Reconstruction  Act"  (March  2,  1867). 

486.  The    Reconstruction    Act.  —  The     Eeconstruction    Act 
marked  out  the  ten  unreconstructed  states  (Tennessee  had  been 


RECONSTRUCTION   OF   THE  SOUTH  431 

admitted  to  Congress  in  March,  1866)  into  five  districts,  with 
an  army  officer  in  command  of  each,  and  required  the  people 
of  each  state  to  make  a  new  constitution  giving  negroes  the 
right  to  vote,  and  send  the  constitution  to  Congress.  If  Con 
gress  accepted  it,  and  if  the  legislature  assembled  under  it 
ratified  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  they  might  send  senators 
and  representatives  to  Congress,  and  not  before. 

To  these  terms  six  states  (North  Carolina,  South  Carolina, 
Florida,  Alabama,  Louisiana,  and  Arkansas)  submitted,  and  in 
June,  1868,  they  were  readmitted  to  Congress.  Their  ratifica 
tion  of  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  made  it  a  part  of  the  Con 
stitution,  and  in  July,  1868,  it  was  declared  in  force. 

487.  "Tenure  of  Office  Act";  Johnson  impeached.  —  By  this  time 
the  quarrel  between  the  President  and  Congress  had  reached 
such  a  crisis  that  the  Republican  leaders  feared  he  would 
obstruct  the  execution  of  the  reconstruction  law  by  removing 
important  officials  chiefly  responsible  for  its  administration, 
and  putting  in  their  places  men  who  would  not  enforce  it. 
To  prevent  this,  Congress,  in  1867,  passed  the  "Tenure  of 
Office  Act."  Hitherto  a  President  could  remove  almost  any 
Federal  office  holder  at  pleasure.  Henceforth  he  could  only 
suspend  while  the  Senate  examined  into  the  cause  of  suspen 
sion.  If  it  approved,  the  man  was  removed ;  if  it  disapproved, 
the  man  was  reinstated.  Johnson  denied  the  right  of  Congress 
to  make  such  a  law,  and  very  soon  disobeyed  it. 

In  August,  1867,  he  asked  Secretary  of  War  Stanton  to 
resign,  and  when  the  Secretary  refused,  suspended  him  and 
made  General  Grant  temporary  Secretary.  All  this  was  legal, 
but  when  Congress  met,  and  the  Senate  disapproved  of  the  sus 
pension,  General  Grant  gave  the  office  back  again  to  Stanton. 
Johnson  then  appointed  General  Lorenzo  Thomas  Secretary 
of  War,  and  ordered  him  to  seize  the  office.  For  this,  and  for 
his  abusive  speeches  about  Congress,  the  House  of  Represent 
atives  impeached  him,  and  the  Senate  tried  him  "for  high 
crimes  and  misdemeanors,"  but  failed  by  one  vote  to  find  him 
guilty.  Stanton  then  resigned  his  office. 


432 


"THE    INDESTRUCTIBLE    UNION 


SUMMARY 

1.  In  1864  the  Republican  party  was  split,  and  one  part,  taking  the 

name  of  National  Union  party,  renominated  Lincoln.  The  other  or 
radical  wing,  which  wanted  a  more  vigorous  war  policy,  nominated 
Fremont  and  Cochrane.  The  Democrats  declared  the  war  a  failure, 
demanded  peace,  and  nominated  McClelkm  and  Pendleton. 

2.  The  gradual  conquest  of  the  South  brought  up  the  question  of  the 

relation  to  the  Federal  government  of  a  state  which  had  seceded. 

3.  Lincoln  marked  out  his  own  plan  of  reconstruction  in  an  amnesty 

proclamation.  Congress  thought  he  had  no  right  to  do  this,  and 
adopted  a  plan  which  Lincoln  vetoed.  His  death  left  the  question 
for  Johnson  to  settle. 

4.  Johnson  adopted  a  plan  of  his  own  and  soon  came  into  conflict  with 

Congress. 

5.  Congress  began  by  refusing  seats  to  congressmen  from  states  recon 

structed  on  Johnson's  plan.  It  then  passed,  over  Johnson's  veto, 
a  series  of  bills  to  protect  the  freedmen  and  give  them  civil  rights. 

6.  Six  states  accepted  the  terms  of  reconstruction  offered,  and  their  sen 

ators  and  representatives  were  admitted  to  Congress  (1868). 

7.  Johnson,  in  1866,  traveled  about  the  West  abusing  Congress.     For 

this,  and  chiefly  for  his  disregard  of  the  Tenure  of  Office  Act,  he 
was  impeached  by  the  House  and  tried  and  acquitted  by  the  Senate. 

States  cannot  secede  ;  only  some  of  their 

people  were  in  insurrection. 
Lincoln's  plan    ,  J  Amnesty  proclamation. 

Recognizes   Arkansas,    Tennessee,    and 

Louisiana. 
Thirteenth  Amendment. 


£  < 

a> 

y. 
c 


pi- 


Johnson's  plan 


Congressional  plan 


(  Provisional  governors. 
J  Ratify  Thirteenth  Amendment, 
j  New  state  constitutions  made. 
(  Congressmen  chosen. 

Congress  refuses  them  seats. 
Civil  Rights  Bill. 
Freedmen's  Bureau  Bill. 
Tenure  of  Office  Act. 
Reconstruction  Act. 
Fourteenth  Amendment. 


Vetoes 


Johnson  vs.  Congress  .  . 


Freedmen's  Bureau  Bill 

Denounces  Congress. 
Violates  Tenure  of  Office  Act. 
Impeached. 


CHAPTER   XXXI 

THE   NEW  WEST    (1860-1870) 

488.  Discovery  of  Gold  near  Pikes  Peak.  —  In  the  summer 
of  1858  news  reached  the  Missouri  that  gold  had  been  found 
on  the  eastern  slope  of  the  Kockies,  and  at  once  a  wild  rush 
set  in  for  the  foot  of  Pikes  Peak,  in  what  was  then  Kansas. 


Crossing  the  plains 


During  1858  a  party  from  the  gold  mines  of  Georgia  pitched 
a  camp  on  Cherry  Creek  and  called  the  place  Aurania.  Later, 
in  the  winter,  they  were  joined  by  General  Larimer  with  a 
party  from  Leavenworth,  Kan.,  and  by  them  the  rude  camp 
at  Aurania  was  renamed  Denver,  in  honor  of  the  governor  of 
Kansas.  In  another  six  months  emigrants  came  pouring  in 
from  every  point  along  the  frontier.  Some,  providing  them 
selves  with  great  white-covered  wagons,  drawn  by  horses, 
oxen,  or  mules,  joined  forces  for  better  protection  against  the 

43-'l 


434  "THE   INDESTRUCTIBLE   UNION" 

Indians,  and  set  out  together,  making  long  wagon  trains  or 
caravans.  All  were  accompanied  by  men  fully  armed.  Such 
as  could  not  afford  a  "prairie  schooner,"  as  the  canvas-covered 
wagon  was  called,  put  their  worldly  goods  into  handcarts. 

By  1859  Denver  was  a  settlement  of  1000  people.  They 
needed  supplies,  and,  to  meet  this  demand,  the  firm  of  Kussell, 
Majors,  and  Waddell  put  a  daily  line  of  coaches  on  the  road 
from  Leavenworth  to  Denver.  This  means  of  communication 
brought  so  many  settlers  that  by  1860  Denver  was  a  city  of 
frame  and  brick  houses,  with  two  theaters,  two  newspapers, 
and  a  mint  for  coining  gold. 

489.  The  Pony  Express  ;  the  Overland  Stage.  —  By  that  time, 
too,  the  first  locomotive  had  reached  the  frontier  of  Kansas. 
But  between  the  Missouri  and  the  Pacific  there  was  still  a  gap 
of  2000  miles  which  the  settlers  demanded  should  be  spanned 
at  onee,  and  it  was.     In  1860  the  same  firm  that  sent  the  first 
stagecoach  over  the  prairie  from  Leavenworth  to  Denver,  ran 
a  pony  express  from  the  Missouri  to  the  Pacific.     Their  plan 
was  to  start  at  St.  Joseph,  Mo.,  and  send  the  mail  on  horse 
back  across  the  continent   to   San  Francisco.     As  the  speed 
must  be  rapid,  there  must  be  frequent  relays.     Stations  were 
therefore  established  every  twenty-five   miles,   and  at  them 
fresh  horses  and  riders  were   kept.     Mounted  on  a  spirited 
Indian  pony,  the  mail  carrier  would  set  out  from  St.  Joseph 
and  gallop  at  breakneck  speed  to  the  first  relay  station,  swing 
himself  from  his  pony,  vault  into  the  saddle  of  another  stand 
ing  ready,   and  dash  on  toward  the  next  station.     At  every 
third  relay  a  fresh  rider  took  the  mail.     Day  and  night,  in 
sunshine  and  storm,  over  prairie  and  mountain,  the  mail  car 
rier  pursued  his  journey  alone.     The  cost  in  human  life  was 
immense.     The  first  riders  made  the  journey  of  1996  miles  in 
ten  days.     Next  came  the  Wells  and  Fargo  Express,  and  then 
the  Butterfield  Overland  Stage  Company. 

490.  The  Union  Pacific  Railroad;    the  Land  Grant  Roads.— 
Meantime  the  war  opened,  and  an  idea  often  talked  of  took 
definite  shape.     California   had   scarcely  been   admitted,    in 


THE  NEW  WEST   (1860-1870) 

1850,  when  the  plan  to  bind  her  firmly  to  the  Union  by  a  great 
railroad,  built  at  national  cost,  was  urged  vigorously.  By  1856 
the  people  began  to  demand  it,  and  in  that  year  the  Eepublican 
party,  and  in  1860  both  the  Eepublican  and  Democratic  parties, 
pledged  themselves  to  build  one.  The  secession  of  the  South, 
and  the  presence  at  Denver  of  a  growing  population,  made 
the  need  imperative,  and  in  1862  Congress  began  the  work. 

Two  companies  were  chartered.  One,  the  Union  Pacific, 
was  to  begin  at  Omaha  and  build  westward.  The  other,  the 
Central  Pacific,  was  to  begin  at  Sacramento  and  build  east 
ward  till  the  two  met.  The  Union  Pacific  was  to  receive  from 
the  government  a  subsidy  in  bonds  of  $16,000  for  each  mile 
built  across  the  plains,  $48,000  for  each  of  150  miles  across 
the  Eocky  Mountains,  and  $32,000  a  mile  for  the  rest  of 
the  way.  It  received  all  told  on  its  1033  miles  $27,226,000. 
The  Central  Pacific,  under  like  conditions,  received  for  its 
883  miles  from  San  Francisco  to  Ogden  $27,850,000.  But  the 
liberality  of  Congress  did  not  end  here.  Each  road  was  also 
given  every  odd-numbered  section  in  a  strip  of  public  land 
twenty  miles  wide  along  its  entire  length. 

491.  Land  Grants  for  Railroads  and  Canals.  —  Grants  of  land 
in  aid  of  such  improvements  were  not  new.     Between  1827 
and  1860  Congress  gave  away  to  canals,  roads,  and  railroads 
215,000,000   acres.     This   magnificent   expanse   would   make 
seven  states  as  large  as  Pennsylvania,  or  three  and  a  half  as 
large  as  Oregon,  and  is  only  6000  acres  less  than  the  total  area 
of  the  thirteen  original  states  with  their  present  boundaries. 

Although  the  roads  were  chartered  in  1862,  the  work  of 
construction  was  slow  at  first,  and  the  last  rail  was  not  laid 
till  May  10,  1869. 

492.  The  Silver  Mines;   New  States  and  Territories. —What 
the  discovery  of  gold  did  for  California  and  Denver,  silver  and 
the  railroad  did  for  the  country  east  of  the  Sierras.     In  1859 
some  gold  seekers  in  what  was  then  Utah  discovered  the  rich 
silver  mines  on   Mt.    Davidson.     Population  rushed  in,  Vir 
ginia  City  sprang  into  existence,  the  territory  of  Nevada  was 


436  "THE   INDESTRUCTIBLE    UNION" 

-formed  in  1861,  and  in  1864  entered  the  Union  as  a  state.  In 
1861  Colorado  was  made  a  territory,  and  what  is  now  North 
and  South  Dakota  and  the  land  west  of  them  to  the  Rocky 
Mountain  divide  became  the  territory  of  Dakota.  Hardly  was 
this  done  when  gold  was  found  in  a  gulch  on  the  Jefferson 
Fork  of  the  Missouri  Eiver.  Bannock  City,  Virginia  City,  and 
Helena  were  laid  out  almost  immediately,  and  in  1864  Montana 
was  made  a  territory.  In  1860  and  1862  precious  metals  were 
found  in  what  was  then  eastern  Washington ;  Lewiston,  Idaho 
City,  and  the  old  Hudson  Bay  Company's  post  of  Fort  Boise 
became  thriving  towns,  and  in  1863  the  territory  of  Idaho  was 
formed,  with  limits  including  what  is  now  Montana  and  part 
of  Wyoming.  In  1863  Arizona  was  cut  off  from  New  Mexico, 
and  in  1868  Wyoming  was  made  a  territory. 

493.  Population  in  1870.  —  Thus  in  the  decade  from  1860  to 
1870  gold,  silver,  and  the  Pacific  Railroad  gave  value  to  the 
American  Desert,  brought  two  states  (Nevada  and  Nebraska) 
into  the  Union,  and  caused  the  organization  of  six  new  territo 
ries.  More  than  1,000,000  people  then  lived  along  the  line  of  the 
Union  Pacific.  Our  total  population  in  1870  was  38,000,000. 

SUMMARY 

1.  What  the  discovery  of  gold  did  for  California  in  1849,  it  did  for  the 

"Great  American  Desert"  in  1858. 

2.  The  consequences  were  the  founding  of  Denver,  the  establishment  of 

a  stagecoach  line  from  the  Missouri  to  Denver,  the  pony  express  to 
the  Pacific ;  the  overland  coach  ;  and  the  Pacific  Railroad. 

3.  Gold,  the  railroad,  and  the  silver  mines  led  to  the  organization  of  Colo 

rado,  Nevada,  Montana,  Idaho,  and  Wyoming,  and  the  admission 
of  Nebraska  and  Nevada  into  the  Union. 

4.  Other  causes  led  to  the  organization  of  Arizona  and  Dakota. 


New  States 
(1860-1870). 


Kansas,  1861. 
West  Virginia,  1863. 
Nevada,  1864.  New  Territories 

Nebraska,  1867.  (1860-1870). 

Total     number     of 
states  in  1870,  37. 


Colorado,  1861. 
Dakota,  1861. 
Idaho,  1863. 
Arizona,  1863. 
Montana,  1864. 
Wyoming,  1868. 


THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 
CHAPTER   XXXII 

POLITICS  FROM   1808  TO   1880 

494.  New  Issues  before  the  People.  —  Five  years  had  now 
passed  since  the  surrender  of  Lee,  and  nine  since  the  firing  on 
Sumter.     During  these  years  the  North,  aroused  and  united 
by  the  efforts  put  forth  to  crush  the  Confederacy,  had  entered 
Dn  a  career  of  prosperity  and  development  greater  than  ever 
enjoyed  in  the  past.     With  this  changed  condition  came  new 
issues,  some  growing  out  of  the  results  of  the  war,  and  some 
3ut  of  the  development  of  the  country. 

495.  Amnesty.  —  In  the  first  place,  now  that  the  war  was 
Dver,  the  people  were  heartily  tired  of  war  issues.     Taking 
advantage  of  this,  certain  political  leaders  began,  about  1870, 
to  demand  a  "  general  amnesty  " l  or  forgiveness  for  the  rebels, 
and  a  stoppage  of  reconstructive  measures  by  Congress. 

496.  The  National  Finances.  —  A  second  issue  resulting  from 
the  war  was  the  management  of  the  national  finances.     Janu 
ary  1,   1866,  the  national  debt  amounted  to  $2,740,000,000, 
including  (1)  the  bonded  debt  of  $1,120,000,000,  and  (2)  the 
unbonded  or  floating  debt  of  $1,620,000,000,  that  part  made 
up  of  "greenbacks,"  fractional  currency,  treasury  notes,  and 
the  like.     Two  problems  were  thus  brought  before  the  people: 

1.  What  shall  be  done  with  the  national  bonded  debt? 

2.  How  shall  the  paper  money  be  disposed  of  and  "specie 

payment "  resumed  ? 

1  In  1863,  Lincoln  offered  "full  pardon1'  to  "all  persons"  except  the 
leaders  of  the  "existing  rebellion."  Johnson,  in  1865,  again  offered 
amnesty,  but  increased  the  classes  of  excepted  persons ;  and,  though  in 
the  autumn  of  1867  he  cut  down  the  list,  he  nevertheless  left  a  great 
many  men  unpardoned. 

437 


438  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

As  to  the  first  question,  it  was  decided  to  pay  the  bonds  as 
fast  as  possible;  and  by  1873  the  debt  was  reduced  by  more 
than  $500,000,000. 

As  to  the  second  question,  it  was  decided  to  "contract  the 
currency  "  by  gathering  into  the  Treasury  and  there  canceling 
the  "greenbacks."  This  was  begun,  and  their  amount  was 
reduced  from  $449,000,000  in  1864  to  $356,000,000  in  1868. 

By  that  time  a  large  part  of  the  people  in  the  West  were 
finding  fault  with  "contraction."  Calling  in  the  greenbacks, 
they  held,  was  making  money  scarce  and  lowering  prices.  Con 
gress,  therefore,  in  1868  yielded  to  the  pressure,  and  ordered 
that  further  contraction  should  stop  and  that  there  should  not 
be  less  than  $356,000,000  of  greenbacks. 

497.  "  The  Ohio  Idea  "  ;  the  Greenback  Party.  —  But  there  was 
still  another  idea  current.  To  understand  this,  six  facts  must 
be  remembered.  1.  In  1862  Congress  ordered  the  issue  of 
certain  5-20  bonds;  that  is,  bonds  that  might  be  paid  after  five 
years,  but  must  be  paid  in  twenty  years.  2.  The  interest  on 
these  bonds  was  made  payable  "  in  coin."  3.  But  nothing  was 
said  in  the  bond  as  to  the  kind  of  money  in  which  the  prin 
cipal  should  be  paid.  4.  When  the  greenbacks  were  issued, 
the  law  said  they  should  be  "  lawful  money  and  a  legal  tender 
for  all  debts,  public  and  private,  within  the  United  States, 
except  duties  on  imports  arid  interest  as  aforesaid."  5.  This 
made  it  possible  to  pay  the  principal  of  the  5-20  bonds  in 
greenbacks  instead  of  coin.  6.  Fearing  that  payment  of  the 
principal  in  greenbacks  might  have  a  bad  effect  on  future 
loans,  Congress,  when  it  passed  the  next  act  (March  3,  1863) 
for  borrowing  money,  provided  that  both  principal  and  interest 
should  be  paid  in  coin. 

At  that  time  and  long  after  the  war  "  coin  "  commanded  a 
premium;  that  is,  it  took  more  than  100  cents  in  paper  money 
to  buy  100  cents  in  gold.  Anybody  who  owned  a  bond  could 
therefore  sell  the  coin  he  received  as  interest  for  paper  and  so 
increase  the  rate  of  interest  measured  in  paper  money.  The 
bonds,  again,  could  not  be  taxed  by  any  state  or  municipality. 


POLITICS   FROM   1868  TO   1880  439 

Because  of  these  facts,  there  arose  a  demand  after  the  war 
for  two  things  —  taxation  of  the  bonds  and  payment  of  the 
5-20's  in  greenbacks.  This  idea  was  so  prevalent  in  Ohio  in 
1868  that  it  was  called  the  "Ohio  idea,"  and  its  supporters 
were  called  "Greenbackers." 

498.  Opposition  to  Land  Grants  to  Railroads.  —  Much  fault 
was  now  found  with  Congress  for  giving  away  such  great  tracts 
of  the  public  domain.     In  1862  a  law  known,  as  the  Home 
stead  Act  was  passed.     By  it  a  farm  of  80  or  160  acres  was 
to  be  given  to  any  head  of  a  family,  or  any  person  twenty- 
one  years  old,   who  was  a  citizen  of  the  United   States  or, 
being  foreign  born,   had  declared   an  intention  to  become  a 
citizen,  provided  he  or  she  lived  on  the  farm  and  cultivated 
it  for  five  years.     Under  this  great  and  generous  law  103,000 
entries  for  12,000,000  acres  were  made  between  1863  and  1870. 
This  showed  that  the  people  wanted  land  and  was  one  reason 
why  it  should  not  be  given  to  corporations. 

499.  The  Election  of  1868.  —  The  questions  discussed  above 
(pp.  437-439)  became  the  political  issues  of  1868. 

The  Republicans  nominated  Grant  and  Schuyler  Colfax 
and  declared  for  the  payment  of  all  bonds  in  coin;  for  a 
reduction  of  the  national  debt  and  the  rate  of  interest;  and 
for  the  encouragement  of  immigration. 

The  Democrats  nominated  Horatio  Seymour  and  Francis 
P.Blair,  and  demanded  amnesty;  rapid  payment  of  the  debt; 
"  one  currency  for  the  government,  and  the  people,  the  laborer, 
and  the  office  holder";  the  taxation  of  government  bonds; 
and  no  land  grants  for  public  improvements. 

The  popular  vote  was  5,700,000.  In  the  electoral  college 
Grant  had  214  votes,  and  Seymour  80. 

500.  Troubles  in   the  South;    the    Ku    Klux    Klan.  —  Grant 
and  Colfax  began  their  term  of  office  on  March  4,  1869,  and 
soon  found  that  the  reconstruction  policy  of  Congress  had  not 
been  so  successful  as  they  could  wish,  and  that  the  work  of 
protecting  the  freedman  in  the  exercise  of  his  new  rights  was 
not  yet  completed.     Three  states  (Virginia,  Mississippi,  and 


440  THE  ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

Texas)  had  not  yet  complied  with  the  conditions  imposed 
by  Congress,  and  were  still  refused  seats  in  the  House  and 
Senate.  No  sooner  had  the  others  complied  with  the  Recon 
struction  Act  of  1867,  and  given  the  negro  the  right  to  vote, 
than  a  swarm  of  Northern  politicians,  generally  of  the  worst 
sort,  went  down  and,  as  they  said,  "ran  things."  They  began 
by  persuading  the  negroes  that  their  old  masters  were  about 
to  put  them  back  into  slavery,  that  it  was  only  by  electing 
Union  men  to  office  that  they  could  remain  free ;  and  having 
•by  this  means  obtained  control  of  the  negro  vote,  they  were 
made  governors  and  members  of  Congress,  and  were  sent  to 
the  state  legislature,  where,  seated  beside  negroes  who  could 
neither  read  nor  write,  but  who  voted  as  ordered,  these 
"  carpetbaggers," l  as  they  were  called,  ruled  the  states  in 
the  interest  of  themselves  rather  than  in  that  of  the  people. 

Now,  you  must  remember  that  in  many  of  the  Southern 
states  the  negro  voters  greatly  outnumbered  the  white  voters, 
because  there  were  more  black  men  than  white  men,  and  be 
cause  many  of  the  whites  were  still  disfranchised ;  that  is,  could 
not  vote.  When  these  men,  who  were  property  owners  and 
taxpayers,  found  that  the  carpetbaggers,  by  means  of  the 
negro  vote,  were  plundering  and  robbing  the  states,  they 
determined  to  prevent  the  negro  from  voting,  and  so  drive 
the  carpetbaggers  from  the  legislatures.  To  do  this,  in  many 
parts  of  the  South  they  formed  secret  societies,  called  "  The 
Invisible  Empire"  and  "The  Ku  Klux  Klan."  Completely 
disguised  by  masks  and  outlandish  dresses,  the  members  rode 
at  night,  and  whipped,  maimed,  and  even  murdered  the  objects 
of  their  wrath,  who  were  either  negroes  who  had  become  local 
political  leaders,  or  carpetbaggers,  or  "scalawags,"  as  the 
Southern  whites  who  supported  the  negro  cause  were  called. 

501.  The  Fifteenth  Amendment.  —  To  secure  the  negro  the 
right  to  vote,  and  make  it  no  longer  dependent  on  state  action, 

1  As  the  men  were  not  natives  of  the  South,  had  no  property  there,  and 
were  mostly  political  adventurers,  they  were  called  "carpetbaggers,"  or 
men  who  owned  nothing  save  what  they  brought  in  their  carpetbags. 


442  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

a  Fifteenth  Amendment  was  passed  by  Congress  in  February, 
1869,  and,  after  ratification  by  the  necessary  number  of  states, 
was  put  in  force  in  March,  1870.  As  the  Ku  Klux  were  viola 
ting  this  amendment,  by  preventing  the  negroes  from  voting, 
Congress,  in  1871,  passed  the  "Ku  Klux"  or  "Force"  Act. 
It  prescribed  fine  and  imprisonment  for  any  man  convicted  of 
hindering,  or  even  attempting  to  hinder,  any  negro  from  vot 
ing,  or  the  votes,  when  cast,  from  being  counted. 

502.  Rise  of  the  Liberal  Republicans.  —  This  legislation  and 
the  conflicts  that  grew  out  of  it  in  Louisiana  kept  alive  the 
old  issue  of  amnesty,  and  in  Missouri  split  the  Republican 
party  and  led  to  the  rise  of  a  new  party,  which  received  the 
name  of  "  Liberal  Republicans,"  because  it  was  in  favor  of  a 
more   liberal   treatment   of   the    South.     From   Missouri,  the 
movement  spread  into  Iowa,  into  Kansas,  into  Illinois,  and 
into  New  Jersey,  and  by  1872  was  serious  enough  to  encour 
age  the  leaders  to  call  for  a  national  convention  which  gathered 
at  Cincinnati  (May,  1872),  and,  after  declaring  for  amnesty, 
universal  suffrage,  civil  service  reform,  and  no  more  land  grants 
to  railroads,  nominated  Horace  Greeley,  of  New  York,  for 
President,  and  B.  Gratz  Brown,  the  Liberal  leader  of  Missouri, 
for  Vice  President.     The  nomination  of  Greeley  displeased  a 
part   of   the   convention,   which  went  elsewhere,   and  nomi 
nated  W.  S.  Groesbeck  and  F.  L.  Olmsted.     The  Republicans 
met  at  Philadelphia  in  June,  and  nominated  Grant  and  Henry 
Wilson.    The  Democrats  pledged  their  support  to  Greeley  and 
Brown ;    but  this  act  displeased  so  many  of  the  Democratic 
party,  that  another  convention  was  held,  and  Charles  O'Conor 
and  John  Quincy  Adams  were  placed  in  the  field. 

503.  The  National  Labor-Reform  Party.  —  From  about  1829, 
when  the  establishment  of  manufactures,  the  building  of  turn 
pikes  and  canals,  the  growth  of  population,  the  rise  of  great 
cities,  and  the  arrival  of  emigrants  from  Europe  led  to   the 
appearance   of   a  great   laboring  class,   the  workingman  had 
been  in  politics.     But  it  was  not  till  the  close  of  the  war  that 
labor   questions  assumed  national  importance.     In  1865   the 


POLITICS  FROM   1868  TO   1880  443 

first  National  Labor  Congress  was  held  at  Louisville  in  Ken 
tucky.  In  1866  a  second  met  at  Baltimore ;  a  third  at  Chicago 
in  1867 ;  and  a  fourth  at  New  York  in  1868,  to  which  came 
woman  suffragists  and  labor-reform  agitators.  The  next  met 
at  Philadelphia  in  1869  and  called  for  a  great  National  Labor 
Congress  which  met  at  Cincinnati  in  1870  and  demanded 

1.  Lower  interest  on  government  bonds. 

2.  Repeal  of  the  law  establishing  the  national  banks. 

3.  Withdrawal  of  national  bank  notes. 

4.  Issue  of  paper  money  "  based  on  the  faith  and  resources 

of  the  nation,"  to  be  legal  tender  for  all  debts. 

5.  An  eight-hour  law. 

6.  Exclusion  of  the  Chinese. 

7.  No  land  grants  to  corporations. 

8.  Formation  of  a  "  National  Labor-Kef orm  Party." 

The  idea  of  a  new  party  with  such  principles  was  so  heartily 
approved,  that  a  national  convention  met  at  Columbus,  0.,  in 
1872,  denounced  Chinese  labor,  demanded  taxation  of  govern 
ment  bonds,  and  nominated  David  Davis  and  Joel  Parker. 
When  they  declined,  O'Conor  was  nominated. 

504.  Anti-Chinese  Movement.  —  The  demand  in  the  Labor 
platform  for  the  exclusion  of  Chinese  makes  it  necessary  to 
say  a  word  concerning  "  Mongolian  labor." 

Chinamen  were  attracted  to  our  shore  by  the  discovery  of 
gold  in  California,  but  received  little  attention  till  1852,  when 
the  governor  in  a  message  reminded  the  legislature  that  the 
Chinese  came  not  as  freemen,  but  were  sent  by  foreign  capital 
ists  under  contract;  that  they  were  the  absolute  slaves  of 
these  masters;  that  the  gold  they  dug  out  of  our  soil  was 
sent  to  China ;  that  they  could  not  become  citizens ;  and  that 
they  worked  for  wages  so  low  that  no  American  could  compete 
with  them. 

The  legislature  promptly  acted,  and  repeatedly  attempted 
to  stop  their  immigration  by  taxing  them.  But  the  Supreme 
Court  declared  such  taxation  illegal,  whereupon,  the  state  hav- 


444  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

ing  gone  as  far  as  it  could,  an  appeal  was  made  to  Congress. 
That  body  was  deaf  to  all  entreaties;  but  the  President 
through  Anson  Burlingame  in  1868  secured  some  new  articles 
to  the  old  Chinese  treaty  of  1858.  Henceforth  it  was  to  be  a 
penal  offense  to  take  Chinamen  to  the  United  States  without 
their  free  consent.  This  was  not  enough,  and  in  order  to  force 
Congress  to  act,  the  question  was  made  a  political  issue. 

505.  The  Prohibition  Party. — The  temperance  cause  in  the 
United  States  dates  back  to  1810.     But  it  was  not  till  Maine 
passed  a  law  forbidding  the  sale  of  liquor,  in  1851,  and  her 
example  was  followed  by  Vermont  and  Rhode  Island  in  1852, 
by  Connecticut  in  1854,  and  by  New  York,  New  Hampshire, 
Michigan,  and  Iowa,  in  1855,  that  prohibition  became  an  issue. 
The  war  turned  the  thoughts  of  people  to  other  things.     But 
after  the  war,  prohibition  parties  began  to  appear  in  several 
states,  and  in  1869  steps  were  taken  to  unite  and  found  a 
national  party.     In   that  year,  the   Grand   Lodges   of   Good 
Templars  held  a  convention  at  Oswego,  N.Y.,  and  by  these 
men  a  call  was  issued  for  a  national  convention  of  prohibi 
tionists  to  form  a  political  party.     The  delegates  thus  sum 
moned  met  at  Chicago  in  September,  1869,  and  there  founded 
the  "National  Prohibition  Reform -party."     The  first  national 
nominating  convention  was  held  at  Columbus,  0.,  in  1872,  when 
James  Black  of   Pennsylvania  was  nominated  for  President, 
and  John  Russell  of  Michigan  for  Vice  President. 

506.  Campaign  of  1872.  —  At  the  beginning  of  the  campaign 
there  were  thus  seven  presidential  candidates  before  the  people. 
But  some  refused  to  run,  and  others  had  no  chance,  so  that  the 
contest  was  really  between  General  Grant  and  Horace  Greeley, 
who  was  caricatured  unmercifully.    The  benevolent  face  of  the 
great  editor,  spectacled,  and  fringed  with  a  snow-white  beard, 
appeared  on  fans,  on  posters,  on  showcards,  where,  as  a  setting 
sun,  it  might  be  seen  going  down  behind  the  western  hills. 
"  Go  west,"  his  famous  advice  to  young  men,  became  the  slang 
phrase  of  the  hour.     He  was  defeated,  for  Grant  carried  thirty- 
one  states,  and  Greeley  six. 


POLITICS  FROM   1868   TO   1880  445 

In  many  respects  this  was  a  most  interesting  election.  For 
the  first  time  in  our  history  the  freedmen  voted  for  presi 
dential  electors.  For  the  first  time  since  1860  the  people  of  all 
the  states  took  part  in  the  election  of  a  President  of  the  United 
States,  while  the  number  of  candidates,  Labor,  Prohibition, 
Liberal  Republican,  Democratic,  and  Republican,  showed  that 
the  old  issues  which  caused  the  war  or  were  caused  by  the  war 
were  dead  or  dying,  and  that  new  ones  were  coming  forward. 

507.  Panic  of   1873.  —  Now,  all  these  things,  the  immense 
expansion  of  the  railroads,  and  the  great  outlay  necessary  for 
rebuilding  Chicago,  much  of  which  had  been  burned  in  1871, 
and  Boston,  which  suffered  from  a  great  fire  in  1872,  absorbed 
money  and  made  it  difficult  to  get.     Just  in  the  midst  of  the 
stringency  a  quarrel  arose  between  the  farmers  and  the  rail 
roads  in  the  West,  and  made  matters  worse.     It  stopped  the 
sale  of  railroad  bonds,  and  crippled  the  enterprises  that  de 
pended  on  such  sale  for  funds.      It  impaired  the  credit  of 
bankers  concerned  in  railroad  building,  and  in  September,  1873, 
a  run  on  them  for  deposits  began  till  one  of  them,  Jay  Cooke 
&  Co.,  failed,  and  at  once  a  panic  swept  over  the  business  world. 
Country  depositors  demanded  their  money  ;  the  country  banks 
therefore  withdrew  their  deposits  with  the  city  banks,  which 
in  turn  called  in  their  loans,  and  industry  of  every  kind  stopped. 
In  1873  there  were  5000  failures,  and  in  1874  there  were  5800. 
Hours  of  labor  were  reduced,  wages  were  cut  down,  working- 
men  were  discharged  by  thousands. 

508.  The  Inflation  Bill.  —  In  hope  of  relieving  this  distress 
by  making  money  easier  to  get,  a  demand  was  now  made  that 
Congress  should  issue  more  greenbacks.     To  this  Congress,  in 
1874,  responded  by  passing  the  "  Inflation  Bill,"  declaring  that 
there  should  be  §400,000,000  in  greenbacks,  no  more,  no  less. 
As  the  limit  fixed  in  1868  was  $356,000,000  (p.  438),  the  bill 
tended  to  "  inflate  "  or  add  to  the  paper  currency  $44,000,000. 
Grant  vetoed  the  bill. 

509.  Resumption  of  Specie  Payments.  —  What  shall  be  done 
with  the  currency  ?  now  became  the  question  of  the  hour,  and 

McM.  HIST. —25 


446  THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

at  the  next  session  of  Congress  (1874-75)  another  effort  was 
made  to  answer  it,  and  "  an  act  to  provide  for  the  resumption 
of  specie  payments  "  was  passed. 

1.  Under  this  law,  silver  10,  25,  and  50  cent  pieces  were  to  be 

exchanged  through  the  post  offices  and  subtreasuries  for 
fractional  ourrency  till  it  was  all  redeemed. 

2.  Surplus  revenue  might  be  used  and  bonds  issued  for  the 

purchase  of  coin. 

3.  That  part  of  an  act  of  1870  which  limited  the  amount  of 

national  bank  notes  to  $354,000,000  was  repealed. 

4.  The  banks  could  now  put  out  more  bills ;  but  for  each  $100 

they  put  out  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  must  call  in 
$80  of  greenbacks,  till  but  $300,000,000  of  them  re 
mained. 

5.  After  January  1, 1879,  he  must  redeem  them  all  on  demand. 

510.  The  Political  Issues  of  1876.  —  The  currency  question, 
the  hard  times  which  had  continued  since  1873,  the  rise  of  the 
Labor  and  Prohibition  parties,  the  reports  of  shameful  cor 
ruption  and  dishonesty  in  every  branch  of  the  public  service, 
the  dissatisfaction  of  a  large  part  of  the  Republican  party 
with  the  way  affairs  were   managed   by  the  administration, 
combined  to  make  the  election  of  1876  very  doubtful.      The 
general  displeasure  was  so  great  that  the  Democratic  party 
not  only  carried  state  elections  in  the  North  in  1874  and  1875, 
but  secured  a  majority  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 

511.  Nomination  of  Presidential  Candidates.  — When  the  time 
came  to  make  nominations  for  the  presidency,  the  Prohibition 
party  was  first  to  act.     It  selected  Green  Clay  Smith  of  Ken 
tucky  and  G.  T.  Stewart  of  Ohio  as  its  candidates,  and  de 
manded  that  in  all  the  territories  and  the  District  of  Columbia, 
the  importation,  exportation,  manufacture,  and  sale  of  alcoholic 
beverages  should  be  stopped.     Two  other  demands  —  the  aboli 
tion  of  polygamy  (which  was  practiced  by  the  Mormons  in 
Utah),  and  the  closing  of  the  mails  to  the  advertisements  of 
gambling  and  lottery  schemes  —  have  since  been  secured. 


POLITICS  FROM   1868  TO   1880.  447 

Next  came  the  Greenback  or  Independent  National  party, 
which  nominated  Peter  Cooper  of  New  York  and  Samuel 
F.  Gary  of  Ohio,  and  called  for  the  repeal  of  the  Resump 
tion  of  Specie  Payment  Act,  and  the  issue  of  paper  notes  bear 
ing  a  low  rate  of  interest. 

In  June,  the  Republicans  met  in  Cincinnati,  and  nominated 
Rutherford  B.  Hayes  of  Ohio,  and  William  A.  Wheeler  of 
New  York.  They  endorsed  the  financial  policy  of  the  party, 
demanded  civil  service  reform,  protection  to  American  indus 
tries,  no  more  land  grants  to  corporations,  an  investigation  of 
the  effect  of  Chinese  immigration,  and  "respectful  consider 
ation"  of  the  woman's  rights  question. 

The  Democrats  nominated  Samuel  J.  Tilden  and  Thomas  A. 
Hendricks,  and  called  for  reforms  of  every  kind  —  in  the  civil 
service,  in  the  administration,  in  expenditures,  in  the  internal 
revenue  system,  in  the  currency,  in  the  tariff,  in  the  use  of  pub 
lic  lands,  in  the  treatment  of  the  South. 

512.  Result  of  the  Election.  —  While  the  campaign  was  going 
on,  Colorado  was  admitted  (in  August,  1876)  as  a  state.    There 
were  then  thirty-eight  states  in  the  Union,  casting  369  electoral 
votes.     This  made  185  necessary  for  a  choice ;  and  when  the 
returns  were  all  in,  it  appeared  that,  if  the  Republicans  could 
secure  the  electoral  votes  of  South  Carolina,  Florida,  Louisiana, 
and  Oregon,  they  would  have  exactly  185.    In  these  states,  how 
ever,  a  dispute  was  raging  as  to  which  set  of  electors,  Republi 
can  or  Democratic,  was  elected.    Each  claimed  to  be ;  and,  as  the 
result  depended  on  them,  each  set  met  and  voted.     It  was  then 
for  Congress  to  decide  which  should  be  counted. 

Now,  the  framers  of  the  Constitution  had  never  thought  of 
such  a  condition  of  affairs,  and  had  made  no  provisions  to  meet 
it.  Congress  therefore  provided  for  an 

513.  u Electoral  Commission,"  to  decide  which  of  the  con 
flicting  returns  should  be  accepted.     This  commission  was  to 
be  composed  of  five  senators,  five  representatives,  and  five  jus 
tices  of  the  Supreme  Court.     The  Senate  chose  three  Republi 
cans  and  two  Democrats ;  the  House,  three  Democrats  and  two 


448  THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

Republicans.     Congress  appointed  two   Democratic  and   two 
Republican   justices,   who  chose   the   fifth   justice,   who  was 
a  Republican.      The  Commission  thus  con 
sisted  of  eight  Republicans  and  seven  Demo 
crats.       The    decision    as    to    each   of    the 
disputed  states  was  in  favor  of  the  Republi 
can  electors,  and  as  it  could  not  be  reversed 
unless  both  houses  of  Congress  consented, 
and  as  both  would  not  consent,  Hayes  was 
declared  elected,  over  Tilden,  by  one  electo 
ral  vote  ;  namely,  Hayes,  185 ;  Tilden,  184. 
Rutherford  B.  Hayes         514.    Financial  Policy  of  Grant's  Adminis 
tration.  —  The   inauguration  of   Hayes  was 
followed  by  a  special  session  of  Congress.     In  the  House  was 
a  great  Democratic  majority,  pledged  to  a  new  financial  meas 
ure  —  a  pledge  which  it  soon  made  good. 

The  financial  policy  of  Grant's  eight  years  may  be  summed 
up  briefly : 

1.  (1869)  The  "Credit  Strengthening  Act,"  declaring  that  5-20 

bonds  of  the  United  States  should  be  paid  "  in  coin." 

2.  (1870)  The  Refunding  Act,  by  which  $1,500,000,000  in  bonds 

bearing  five  and  six  per  cent  interest  were  ordered  to  be 
replaced  by  other  bonds  at  four,  four  and  a  half,  and 
five  per  cent.  In  this  refunding,  the  5-20's,  whose  prin 
cipal  was  payable  in  greenbacks,  were  replaced  by  others 
whose  principal  was  payable  "  in  coin." 

3.  (1873)  The  act  of  1873,  by  stopping  the  coinage  of  silver 

dollars,  and  taking  away  the  legal  tender  quality  of  those 
in  circulation,  made  the  words  "in  coin  "  mean  gold. 

4.  (1875)   All  greenbacks  were  to  become  redeemable  in  specie 

on  January  1,  1879. 

5.  To  get  specie,  bonds  might  be  issued. 

515.  Bland  Silver  Bill;  Silver  remonetized.  —  Against  the  con 
tinuance  of  this  policy  the  majority  of  the  House  stood  pledged. 
Before  the  session  closed,  therefore,  two  bills  passed  the  House. 


POLITICS   FROM   1868  TO   1880  449 

One  repealed  so  much  of  the  act  of  1875  as  provided  for  the 
retirement  of  greenbacks  and  the  issue  of  bonds.  The  second 
was  brought  in  by  Mr.  Bland  of  Missouri,  and  is  still  known  by 
his  name.  It  provided 

1.  That  the  silver  dollar  should  again  be  coined,  and  at  the 

ratio  of  16  to  1 ;  that  is,  that  the  same  number  of  dollars 
should  be  made  out  of  sixteen  pounds  of  silver  as  out  of 
one  pound  of  gold. 

2.  That  silver  should  be  a  legal  tender,  at  face  value,  for  all 

debts,  public  and  private. 

3.  That  all  silver  bullion  brought  to  the  mints  should  be  coined 

into  dollars  without  cost  to  the  bringer.  This  was  "  free 
coinage  of  silver." 

The  House  passed  the  bill,  but  the  Senate  rejected  the  "  free 
coinage  "  provision  and  substituted  the  "  Allison  "  amendment. 
Under  this,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  was  to  buy  not  less 
than  $2,000,000,  nor  more  than  $4,000,000,  worth  of  silver 
bullion  each  month,  and  coin  it  into  dollars. 

The  House  accepted  the  Senate  amendment,  and  when  Hayes 
vetoed  the  bill  Congress  passed  it  over  his  veto  and  the  "  Bland- 
Allison  Bill "  became  a  law  in  1878. 

516.  Silver  Certificates.  —  Now  this  return  to  the  coinage  of 
the  silver  dollar  was  open  to  the  objection  that  large  sums  in 
silver  would  be  troublesome  because  of  the  weight.     It  was 
therefore  provided  that  the  coins  might  be  deposited  in  the 
Treasury,  and  paper  "  silver  certificates  "  issued  against  them. 

A  few  months  later,  January  1,  1879,  the  government  re 
turned  to  specie  payment,  and  ever  since  has  redeemed  green 
backs  in  gold,  on  demand. 

517.  Foreign  Relations;    the  French  in  Mexico.  —  The  state 
ment  was  made  (p.  383)  that  with  the  exception  of  Russia  the 
great  powers  of  Europe  sympathized  with  the  South  during 
the  Civil  War.     Two  of  them,  France  and  Great  Britain,  were 
openly   hostile.      The   French  Emperor   allowed  Confederate 
agents   to   contract   for   the   construction   of   war   vessels   in 


450  THE  ECONOMIC  STKUGGLE 

French,  ports,1  and  sent  an  army  into  Mexico  to  overturn 
that  republic  and  establish  an  empire.  Mexico  owed  the  sub 
jects  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Spain  large  sums  of  money, 
and  as  she  would  not  pay,  these  three  powers  in  1861  sent  a 
combined  army  to  hold  her  seaports  till  the  debts  were  paid. 
But  it  soon  became  clear  that  Napoleon  had  designs  against 
the  republic,  whereupon  Great  Britain  and  Spain  withdrew. 
Napoleon,  however,  seeing  that  the  United  States  was  unable 
to  interfere  because  of  the  Civil  War,  went  on  alone,  destroyed 
the  Mexican  republic  and  made  Maximilian  (a  brother  of  the 
Emperor  of  Austria)  Emperor  of  Mexico.  This  was  in  open 
defiance  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  and  though  the  United  States 
protested,  Napoleon  paid  no  attention  till  1865.  Then,  the 
Civil  War  having  ended,  and  Sheridan  with  50,000  veteran 
troops  having  been  sent  to  the  Kio  Grande,  the  French  soldiers 
were  withdrawn  (1867),  and  the  Mexican  republican  party  cap 
tured  Maximilian,  shot  him,  and  reestablished  the  republic. 

518.  The  Alabama   Claims ;    Geneva  Award.  —  The  hostility 
of  Great  Britain  was  more  serious  than  that  of  France.     As  we 
have  seen,  the  cruisers  (Alabama,  Shenandoah,  Florida)  built 
in  her  shipyards  went  to  sea  and  inflicted  great  injury  on 
our  commerce.     Although  she  was  well  aware  of  this,  she  for 
a  long  time  refused  to  make  good  the  damage  done.     But 
wiser  counsel  in  the  end  prevailed,  and  in  1871,  by  the  treaty 
of  Washington,  all  disputed  questions  were  submitted  to  arbi 
tration. 

The  Alabama  claims,  as  they  were  called,  were  sent  to  a  board 
of  five  arbitrators  who  met  at  Geneva  (1872)  and  awarded  the 
United  States  $15,500,000  to  be  distributed  among  our  citizens 
whose  ships  and  property  had  been  destroyed  by  the  cruisers. 

519.  Other  International  Disputes  ;  the  Alaska  Purchase.  — To 
the  Emperor  of  Germany  was  submitted  the  question  of  the 
true  water  boundary  between  Washington  Territory  and  British 
Columbia.     He  decided  in  favor  of  the  United  States  (1872). 

To  a  board  of  Fish  Commissioners  was  referred  the  claim  of 
1  See  Bullock's  Secret  Service  of  the  Confederate  States  in  Europe. 


POLITICS  FROM    1868   TO   1880  451 

Canada  that  the  citizens  of  the  United  States  derived  more 
benefit  from  the  fishing  in.  Canadian  waters  than  did  the  Cana 
dians  from  using  the  coast  waters  of  the  United  States.  The 
award  made  to  Great  Britain  was  $5,500,000  (1877). 

In  1867,  we  purchased  Alaska  from  llus^i^for  $7,200,000. 

SUMMARY        $ 

Financial  History,  1865-1880 

1.  When  the  war  ended,  the  national  debt  consisted  of  two  parts  :  the 

bonded,  and  the  unbonded  or  floating. 

2.  As  public  sentiment  demanded  the   reduction  of  the  debt,  it  was 

decided  to  pay  the  bonds  as  fast  as  possible,  and  contract  the 
currency  by  canceling  the  greenbacks. 

3.  Contraction  went  on  till  1868,  when  Congress  ordered  it  stopped. 

4.  The  payment  of  the  bonds  brought  up  the  question,  Shall  the  5-20's 

be  paid  in  coin  or  greenbacks  ? 

5.  The  Democrats  in  1868  insisted  that  the  bonds  should  be  redeemed 

in  greenbacks  ;  the  Republicans  that  they  should  be  paid  in  coin, 
—  and  when  they  won,  they  passed  the  "Credit  Strengthening 
Act"  of  1869,  and  in  1870  refunded  the  bonds  at  lower  rates. 

6.  In  the  process  of  refunding,  the  5-20's,  whose  principal  was  payable 

in  greenbacks,  were  replaced  by  others  payable  "in  coin."  In 
1873,  the  coinage  of  the  silver  dollar  was  stopped,  and  the  legal- 
tender  quality  of  silver  was  taken  away.  The  words  "in  coin" 
therefore  meant  "  in  gold." 

7.  In  1875  it  was  ordered  that  all  greenbacks  should  be  redeemed  in 

specie  after  January  1,  1879  (resumption  of  specie  payment). 

8.  In  1878  silver  was  made  legal  tender,  and  given  limited  coinage. 

The  South  and  the  Negro 

9.  In  1869,  three  states  still  refused  to  comply  with  the  Reconstruction 

Act  of  1867  and  had  no  representatives  in  Congress. 

10.  Suoh  states  as  had  complied  and  given  the  negro  the  right  to  vote 

were  under  "carpetbag"  rule. 

11.  This  rule  became  so  unbearable  that  the  Ku  Klux  Klan  was  organ 

ized  to  terrify  the  negroes  and  keep  them  from  the  polls. 

12.  Congress  in  consequence  sent  out  the  Fifteenth  Amendment  to  the 

Constitution,  and  in  1871  enacted  the  Force  Act. 

13.  These  and  other  issues,  as  that  of  amnesty,  split  the  Republican  party 

and  led  to  the  appearance  of  the  Liberal  Republicans  in  1872. 

14.  In  general,   however,   party  differences  turned   almost   entirely  on 

financial  and  industrial  issues. 


INDUSTRIAL  AND 
RAILROAD 

MAP   OF 

THE  UNITED  STATES 


452 


453 


CHAPTER   XXXIII 

GROWTH   OF   THE   NORTHWEST 

520.  Results  of  the  War.  —  The  Civil  War  was  fought  by 
the  Nortli  for  the  preservation  of  the  Union  and  by  the  South 
for  the  destruction  of  the  Union.     But  we  who,  after  more 
than  thirty  years,  look  back  on  the  results  of  that  struggle, 
can  see*  that  they  did  not  stop  with  the  preservation  of  the 
Union.     Both  in  the  North  and  in  the  South  the  war  produced 
a  great  industrial  revolution. 

521.  Effect  on  the  South.  —  In  the  South,  in  the  first  place, 
it  changed  the  system  of  labor  from  slave  to  free.     While  the 
South  was  a  slave-owning  country  free  labor  would  not  come 
in.     Without  free  labor  there  could  be  no  mills,  no  factories, 
no  mechanical  industries.     The  South  raised  cotton,  tobacco, 
sugar,  and  left  her  great  resources  undeveloped.    After  slavery 
was  abolished,  the  South  was  on  the  same  footing  as  the  North, 
and  her  splendid  resources  began  at  once  to  be  developed. 

It  was  found  that  her  rich  deposits  of  iron  ore  were  second 
to  none  in  the  world.  It  was  found  that  beneath  her  soil  lay 
an  unbroken  coal  field,  39,000  square  miles  in  extent.  It  was 
found  that  cotton,  instead  of  being  raised  in  less  quantity 
under  a  system  of  free  labor,  was  more  widely  cultivated  than 
ever.  In  1860,  4,670,000  bales  were  grown;  but  in  1894  the 
number  produced  was  9,500,000.  The  result  has  been  the  rise 
of  a  New  South,  and  the  growth  of  such  manufacturing  centers 
as  Birmingham  in  Alabama  and  Chattanooga  in  Tennessee,  and 
of  that  center  of  commerce,  Atlanta,  in  Georgia. 

522.  Rise  of  New  Industries  in  the  North.  —  Much  the  same 
industrial  revolution  has  taken  place  in  the  North.     The  list 

454 


GROWTH  OF  THE  NORTHWEST 


455 


Scene  in  the  oil  regions  of  Pennsylvania 

of  industries  well  known  to  us,  but  unknown  in  I860,  is  a  long 
one.  The  production  of  petroleum  for  commercial  purposes 
began  in  1859,  when  Mr.  Drake  drilled  his  well  near  Titus- 
ville,  in  Pennsylvania.  In  1860  the  daily  yield  of  all  the  wells 
in  existence  was  not  200  barrels.  But  by  1891  this  industry 
had  so  developed  that  54,300,000  barrels  were  produced  in 
that  year,  or  14,900  a  day. 

The  last  thirty  years  have  seen  the  rise  of  cheese  making 
as  a  distinctive  factory  industry;  of  the  manufacture  of  oleo 
margarine,  wire  nails,  Bessemer  steel,  cotton-seed  oil,  coke, 
canned  goods;  of  the  immense  mills  of  Minneapolis,  where 
10,000,000  barrels  of  flour  are  made  annually,  and  of  the 
meat  dressing  and  packing  business  for  which  Chicago  and 
Kansas  City  are  famous. 

523.  The  New  Northwest.  —  When  the  census  was  taken  in 
1860,  so  few  people  were  living  in  what  are  now  Wyoming, 


456  THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

Montana,  and  Idaho  that  they  were  not  counted.  In  Dakota 
there  were  less  than  5000  inhabitants.  The  discovery  of  gold 
and  silver  did  for  these  territories  what  it  had  done  for  Colo 
rado.  It  brought  into  them  so  many  miners  that  in  1870  the 
population  of  these  four  territories  amounted  to  59,000.  Be 
tween  Lake  Superior  (where  in  the  midst  of  a  vast  wilder 
ness  Duluth  had  just  been  laid  out  on  the  lake  shore)  and  the 
mining  camps  in  the  mountains  of  Montana,  there  was  not  a 
town  nor  a  hamlet.  (There  were  indeed  a  few  forts  and  Indian 
agencies  and  a  few  trading  posts.)  Northern  Minnesota  was 
a  forest^  into  which  even  the  lumbermen  had  not  gone.  The 
region  from  the  Missouri  to  the  Rocky  Mountains  was  the 
hunting  ground  of  the  Sioux,  and  was  roamed  over  by  enormous 
herds  of  buffalo. 

524.  The  Northern  Pacific  Railroad.  —  But  this  great  wilder 
ness  was  soon  to  be  crossed  by  one  of  the  civilizers  of  the  age. 
After  years   of  vain   effort,  the  promoters   of  the  Northern 
Pacific  began  the  building  of  their  road  in  1870,  and  pushed 
it  across  the  plains  till  Duluth  and  St.  Paul  were  joined  with 
Puget    Sound.     As    it  went   further  and   further  westward, 
emigrants  followed  it,  towns  sprang  up,  and  cities  grew  with 
astonishing  rapidity. 

525.  The  New  States.  — Idaho,  which  had  no  white  inhabit 
ants  in  1860,  had  32,000  in  1880;  Montana  had  39,000  in  1880, 
as  against  none  in  1860.     Kansas  in  twenty  years  increased 
her  population  four  fold,  and  Nebraska  eight  fold.     This  was 
extraordinary;  but  it  was  surpassed  by  Dakota,  whose  popu 
lation  increased  nearly  ten  fold  in  ten  years  (1870-1880),  and 
in  1889  was  half  a  million.     The  time  had  now  come  to  form 
a  state  government.     But  as  most  of  the  people  lived  in  the 
south  end  of  the  territory,  it  was  cut  in  two,  and  North  and 
South  Dakota  were  admitted  into  the  Union  as  states  on  the 
same   day  (November  2,   1889);    Montana  followed  within  a 
fortnight,  and  Idaho  and  Wyoming  within  a  year  (July,  1890). 
The  four  territories,   in  which  in  1860  there  were  but  5000 
white  settlers,  had  thus  by  1890  become  the  five  states  of 


GROWTH   OF   THE   NORTHWEST 


457 


North  and  South  Dakota,  Montana,  Idaho,  and  Wyoming,  with 
a  population  of  790, 000. l 

526.  Wheat  Farms  and  Cattle  Ranches.  —  Such  a  rush  of  people 
completely  transformed  the  country.  The  "  Great  American 
Desert'''  was  made  productive.  The  buffaloes  were  almost 
exterminated,  and  one  now  is  as  great  a  curiosity  in  the  West 
as  in  the  East.  More  than  7,000,000  were  slaughtered  in 
1871-1872.  In  lieu  of  them  countless  herds  of  cattle  and  sheep, 


A  typical  praine  sod  house 

and  fields  of  wheat  and  corn,  cover  the  plains  and  hills  of  the 
Northwest.  In  1896  Montana  contained  3,000,000  sheep,  and 
Wyoming  and  Idaho  each  over  1,000,000.  In  the  two  Dakotas 
60,000,000  bushels  of  wheat  and  30,000,000  of  corn  were 
harvested.  Many  of  the  farms  are  of  enormous  size.  Ten, 
twenty,  thirty  thousand  acre  farms  are  not  unknown.  One 
contains  75,000  acres. 

Over  this  region,  the  Dakotas,  Montana,  Kansas,  and  Ne 
braska,  wander  herds  of  cattle,  the  slaughtering  and  packing 

1  Colorado  was  admitted  to  the  Union  in  1876,  Washington  in  1889 
(November  11),  and  Utah  in  1896,  so  that  the  total  number  of  states  is 
now  forty-five. 


458  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

of  which  have  founded  new  branches  of  industry.     The  stock 
yards  at  Chicago  make  a  city.1 

527.  Oklahoma.  — The  eagerness  of  the  "cattle  kings"  to 
get  more  land  for  these  herds  to  graze  over  had  much  to  do 
with  the  formation  of  Oklahoma  Territory  and  the  opening  of 
it  for  settlement.     Originally  it  was  part  of  Indian  Territory, 
and  was  sold  by  the  Seminole  Indians  with  the  express  condi 
tion  that  none  but  Indians  and  freedmen  should  settle  there. 
But  the  cattle  kings,  in  defiance  of  the  government,  went  in 
and  inclosed  immense  tracts.     Many  were  driven  out,  only  to 
come  in  again.    Their  expulsion,  with  that  of  small  proprietors 
and  squatters,  called  "boomers,"  led  to  the  demand  that  Okla 
homa   be  opened  to    settlement.      Congress,  seeing  that  the 
uneasy  part  of  the  population  of  Kansas  and  Colorado  could 
not  be  held  in  check  much  longer,  yielded,  and  in  1888  bought 
a  release  from  the  condition,  and  in  1889  opened  Oklahoma. 

528.  The  Boom  Towns —  The  day  for  the  opening  of  a  piece 
of  the  territory  was  April  22,  1889.     The  proclamation  an 
nouncing  it  was  the  signal  for  a  wild  rush  from  every  part  of 
the  West,  till  five  times  as  many  settlers  as  could  possibly 
obtain  land  were  lined  up  on  the  borders  waiting  for  the  sig 
nal  to  cross.     Precisely  at  noon  on  April  22,  a  bugle  sounded, 
a  wild  yell  answered,  a  cloud  of  dust  filled  the  air,  and  an 
army  of  men  on  foot,  on  horseback,  in  wagons,  rushed  into  the 
promised  land.     That  morning  Guthrie  was  a  piece  of  prairie 
land.     That  night  it  was  a  city  of  10,000  souls.     Before  the 
end  of  the  year  60,000  people  were  in  Oklahoma,  building 
towns  and  cities  of  no  mean  character. 

SUMMARY 

1.  One  important  result  of  the  Civil  War  was  a  great  industrial  revolution. 

2.  Mining  for  precious  metals,  the  Northern  Pacific  Railroad,  and  other 

causes  led  to  the  admission  into  the  Union  of  Colorado  (1876),  North 
and  South  Dakota,  Montana,  Washington  (1889),  Idaho,  Wyoming 
(1890),  and  Utah  (1896).  Oklahoma  Territory  was  formed  in  1889. 

1  Read   "  Dakota  Wheat-Fields,"  Harper's  Magazine,  March,  1880 
Also  a  series  of  papers  in  Harper's  Magazine,  for  1888. 


CHAPTER    XXXIV 

MECHANICAL  AND  INDUSTRIAL  PROGRESS 

529.  Mechanical  Progress.  —  The  mechanical  progress  made 
by  our  countrymen  since  the  war  surpasses  that  of  any  previous 
period.     In  1866  another  cable  was  laid  across  the  bed  of  the 
Atlantic  Ocean,  and  worked  successfully.    Before  1876  the  Gat- 
ling  gun,  dynamite,  and  the  barbed-wire  fence  were  introduced; 
the  compressed-air  rock  drill,  the  typewriter,  the  Westing- 
house  air  brake,  the  Janney  car  coupler,  the  cable-car  system, 
the  self -binding  reaper  and  harvester,  the  cash  carrier  for  stores, 
water  gas,   and  the  tin-can-making  machine  were   invented, 
and  Brush  gave  the  world  the  first  successful  electric  light. 

530.  Uses  of  Electricity.  —  Till  Brush  invented  his  arc  light 
and  dynamo,  the  sole  practical  use  made  of  electricity  was  in 
the  field  of  telegraphy.     But  now  in  rapid  succession  came  the 
many  forms  of  electric  lights  and  electric  motors ;  the  electric 
railway,  the  search  light;  photography  by  electric  light;  the 
welding  of  metals  by  electricity;  the  phonograph  and  the  tele 
phone.     In  the  decade  between  1876  and  1886  came  also  the 
hydraulic  dredger,  the   gas  engine,  the  enameling  of  sheet- 
iron  ware  for  kitchen  use,  the  bicycle,  and  the  passenger  ele 
vator,  which  has  transformed  city  life  and  dotted  our  great 
cities  with  buildings  fifteen  and  twenty  stories  high. 

The  decade  1886-1896  gave  us  the  graphophone,  the  kineto- 
scope,  the  horseless  carriage,  the  vestibuled  train,  the  cash 
register,  the  perfected  typewriter;  the  modern  bicycle,  which 
has  deeply  affected  the  life  of  the  people;  and  a  great  develop 
ment  in  photography. 

531.  Rise  of  Great  Corporations.  —  That  mechanical  progress 
so  astonishing  should  powerfully  affect  the  business  and  indus 
trial  world  was  inevitable.     Trades,  occupations,  industries  of 

459 


460  THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

all  sorts,  began  to  concentrate  and  combine,  and  corporations 
took  the  place  of  individuals  and  small  companies.  In  place 
of  the  forty  little  telegraph  companies  of  1856,  there  was  the 
great  Western  Union  Company.  In  place  of  many  petty 
railroads,  there  were  a  few  trunk  lines.  In  place  of  a  hundred 
producers  and  refiners  of  petroleum,  there  was  the  one  Standard 
Oil  Company.  These  are  but  a  few  of  many ;  for  the  rapid 
growth  of  corporations  was  a  characteristic  of  the  period. 

532.  Millionaires  and  "Captains  of  Industry."  —  As  old  lines 
of  industry  were  expanded  and  new  ones  were  created,  the 
opportunities  for  money-getting  were  vastly  increased.     Men 
now  began  to  amass  immense  fortunes  in  gold  and  silver  min 
ing;  by  dealing  in  coal,  in  grain,  in  cattle,  in  oil;  by  specula 
tion  in  stocks;    in  iron  and  steel  making;   in  railroading, — 
millionaires   and   multi-millionaires    became   numerous,    and 
were  often  called  "captains    of  industry,"  as  an  indication 
of  the  power  they  held  in  the  industrial  world. 

533.  Condition  of  Labor.  —  Meanwhile,  the  conditions  of  the 
workingman  were  also  changing  rapidly :     1.    The  chief  em 
ployers  of  labor  were  corporations  and  great  capitalists.    2.  The 
short  voyage  and  low  fare  from  Europe,  the  efforts  made  by 
steamship  companies  to  secure  passengers,  the  immense  busi 
ness  activity  in  the  country  from  1867  to  1872,  and  the  oppor 
tunities  afforded  by  the  rapidly  growing  West,  brought  over 
each  year  hundreds  of  thousands  of  immigrants  from  Europe 
to  swell  the  ranks  of  labor.    Between  1867  and  1873  the  number 
was  2,500,000.     3.  Bad  management  on  the  part  of  some  corpo 
rations;   "watering"  or  unnecessarily  increasing  their  stock 
on  the  part  of  others,  combined  with  sharp  competition,  began, 
especially  after  the  panic  of   1873,  to  cut   down   dividends. 
This  was  followed  by  reduction  of  wages,  or  by  an  increase 
in  the  duties  of  employees,  and  sometimes  by  both. 

534.  Labor   Organizations ;    the   Knights   of   Labor.  —  Trades 
unions  existed  in  our  country  before  the  Constitution;    but 
it  was  at  the  time  of  the  great  industrial  development  dur 
ing  and  after  the  war,  that  the  era  of  unions  opened.      At 


MECHANICAL   AND   INDUSTRIAL   PROGRESS  461 

first  that  of  each  trade  had  no  connection  with  that  of  any 
other.  But  in  1869  an  effort  was  made  to  unite  all  working- 
men  on  the  broad  basis  of  labor,  and  "  The  Noble  Order  of 
Knights  of  Labor  "  was  founded.  For  a  while  it  was  a  secret 
order;  but  in  1878  a  declaration  of  principles  was  made,  which 
began  with  the  statement  that  the  alarming  development  and 
aggressiveness  of  great  capitalists  and  corporations,  unless 
checked,  "would  degrade  the  toiling  masses,"  and  announced 
that  the  only  way  to  check  this  evil  was  to  unite  "all  laborers 
into  one  great  body."  The  knights  were  in  favor  of 

1.  The  creation  of  bureaus  of  labor  for  the  collection  and 

spread  of  information. 

2.  Arbitration  between  employers  and  employed. 

3.  Government  ownership  of  telegraphs,  telephones,  railroads. 

4.  The  reduction  of  the  working  day  to  eight  hours. 

They  were  opposed 

1.  To  the  hiring  out  of  convict  labor. 

2.  To  the  importation  of  foreign  labor  under  contract. 

3.  To  interest-bearing  government  bonds,  and  in  favor  of  a 

national  currency  issued  directly  to  the  people  without 
the  intervention  of  banks. 

535.  The  Workingman  in  Politics.  —  As  these  ends  could  be 
secured  only  by  legislation,  they  very  quickly  became  political 
issues  and  brought  up  a  new  set  of  economic  questions  for 
settlement.  From  1865  to  1870  the  matters  of  public  concern 
were  the  reconstruction  measures  and  the  public  debt.  From 
1870  to  1878  they  were  currency  questions,  civil  service  reform, 
and  land  grants  to  railroads.  From  1878  to  1888  almost  every 
one  of  them  was  in  some  way  directly  connected  with  labor. 

SUMMARY 

1.  Great  inventions  founded  and  developed  new  industries. 

2.  These  in  turn  expanded  the  ranks  of  labor,  and  led  to  the  rise  of  cor 

porations  and  labor  organizations,  and  a  demand  for  a  long  series  of 
reforms. 


CHAPTER   XXXV 

POLITICS   SINCE   1880 

536.  Candidates  in  1880.  —  The  campaign  of  1880  was  opened 
by  the  meeting  of  the  Republican  national  convention  at 
Chicago,  where  a  long  and  desperate  effort  was  made  to  nomi 
nate  General  Grant  for  a  third  term.  But  James  Abram  Gar- 
field  and  Chester  A.  Arthur  were  finally  chosen.  The  platform 
called  for  national  aid  to  state  education,  for  protection  to 
American  labor,  for  the  suppression  of  polygamy  in  Utah,  for 
"  a  thorough,  radical,  and  complete  "  reform  of  the  civil  ser 
vice,  and  for  no  more  land  grants  to  railroads  or  corporations. 

The  Greenback -Labor  party  nominated  James  B.  Weaver 
and  B.  J.  Chambers,  and  declared 

1.  That  all  money  should  be  issued  by  the  government  and 

not  by  banking  corporations. 

2.  That  the  public  domain  must  be  kept  for  actual  settlers 

and  not  given  to  railroads. 

3.  That  Congress  must  regulate  commerce  between  the  states, 

and  secure  fair,  moderate,  and  uniform  rates  for  passen 
gers  and  freight. 

Next  came  the  Prohibition  party  convention,  and  the  nomi 
nation  of  Neal  Dow  and  Henry  Adams  Thompson. 

Last  of  all  was  the  Democratic  convention,  which  nominated 
General  Winfield  S.  Hancock  and  William  H.  English.  The 
platform  called  for 

1.  Honest  money,  consisting  of  gold  and  silver  and  paper 

convertible  into  coin  on  demand. 

2.  A  tariff  for  revenue  only. 

3.  Public  lands  for  actual  settlers. 

462 


POLITICS   SINCE  1880 


463 


537.  Election  and  Death  of  Garfield.  —  The  campaign  was  re 
markable  for  several  reasons : 

1.  Every  presidential  elector  was  chosen  by  popular  vote ;  ana 

every  electoral  vote  was  counted  as  it  was  cast.  This  was 
the  first  presidential  election  in  our  country  of  which  both 
these  statements  could  be  made. 

2.  For  the  first  time  since  1844  there  was  no  agitation  of  a 

Southern  question. 

3.  All  parties  agreed  in  calling  for  anti-Chinese  legislation. 

Garfield  and  Arthur  were  elected,  and  inaugurated  on  March 

4.  1881.     But  on  July  2,  1881,  as  Garfield  stood  in  a  railway 
station  at  Washington,  a  disappointed  office 

seeker  came  up  behind  and  shot  him  in  the 
back.  A  long  and  painful  illness  followed, 
till  he  died  on  September  19,  1881. 

538.  Presidential  Succession —  The  death  of 
Garfield  and  the  succession  of  Arthur  to  the 
presidential  office  left  the  country  in  a  pecul 
iar  situation.      An  act  of  Congress  passed  in 
1792  provided  that  if  both  the  presidency 

and  vice  presidency  were  vacant  at  the  same  Jam 
time,  the  President  pro  tempore  of  the  Senate,  or  if  there 
were  none,  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
should  act  as  President,  till  a  new  one  was 
elected.  But  in  September,  1881,  there  was 
neither  a  President  pro  tempore  of  the  Senate 
nor  a  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representa 
tives,  as  the  Forty-sixth  Congress  ceased  to 
exist  on  March  4,  and  the  Forty-seventh  was 
not  to  meet  till  December.  Had  Arthur  died 
or  been  killed,  there  would  therefore  have 
been  no  President.  It  was  not  likely  that 
such  a  condition  would  happen  again;  but 
attention  was  called  to  the  necessity  of  providing  for  succes 
sion  to  the  presidency,  and  in  1886  a  new  law  was  enacted. 


Chester  A.  Arthur 


464  THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 

Now,  should  the  presidency  and  vice  presidency  both  become 
vacant,  the  presidency  passes  to  members  of  the  Cabinet  in 
the  order  of  the  establishment  of  their  departments,  beginning 
with  the  Secretary  of  State.  Should  he  die,  be  impeached  and 
removed,  or  become  disabled,  it  would  go  to  the  Secretary  of 
the  Treasury,  and  then,  if  necessary,  to  the  Secretary  of  War, 
the  Attorney -general,  the  Postmaster-general,  the  Secretary 
of  the  Navy,  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior. 

539.  Party  Pledges  redeemed.  —  Since  the  Republican  party 
was  in  power,  a  redemption  of  the  pledges  in  their  platform 
(p.  462)  was  necessary,  and  three  laws  of  great  importance  were 
enacted.    One,  the  Edmunds  law  (1882),  was  intended  to  sup 
press   polygamy   in   Utah    and    the   neighboring   territories. 
Another  (1882)  stopped  the  immigration  of  Chinese  laborers 
for  ten  years.      The  third,  the  Pendleton  Civil  Service  Act 
(1883),  was  designed  to  secure  appointment  to  public  office 
on  the  ground  of  fitness,  and  not  for  political  service. 

540.  Corporations. — These  measures  were  all  good  enough 
in  their  way;  but  they  left  untouched  grievances  which  the 
workingmen  and  a  great  part  of  the  people  felt  were  unbear 
able.     That  the  development  of  the  wealth  and  resources  of 
our  country  is  chiefly  due  to  great  corporations  and  great  capi 
talists  is  strictly  true.     But  that  many  of  them  abused  the 
power  their  wealth  gave  them  cannot  be  denied.     They  were 
accused  of  buying  legislatures,  securing  special  privileges,  fix 
ing  prices  to  suit  themselves,  importing  foreign  laborers  under 
contract  in  order  to  depress  wages,  and  favoring  some  customers 
more  than  others. 

541.  The  Anti-monopoly  and  Labor  Parties.  —  Out  of  this  con 
dition  of  affairs  grew  the  Anti-monopoly  party,  which  held  a 
convention  in  1884  and  demanded  that  the  Federal   govern 
ment  should  regulate  commerce  between  the  states;  that  it 
should  therefore  control  the  railroads  and  the  telegraphs;  that 
Congress  should  enact  an  interstate  commerce  law;  and  that 
the  importation  of  foreign  laborers  under  contract  should  be 
made  illegal. 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  465 

This  platform  was  so  fully  in  accordance  with  the  views  of 
She  Greenback  or  National  party,  that  Benjamin  F.  Butler, 
:he  candidate  of  the  Anti-monopolists,  was  endorsed  and  so 
practically  united  the  two  parties. 

542.  The  Republican  and  Democratic  Parties.  —  The  Kepubli- 
?ans  nominated  James  G.  Blaine  and  John  A.  Logan,  and  the 
Democrats   Stephen  G rover  Cleveland  and 

fhomas  A.  Hendricks.  The  Prohibition 
ists  put  up  John  P.  St.  John  and  William 
Daniel.  The  nomination  of  Blaine  was  the 
signal  for  the  revolt  of  a  wing  of  the  Re 
publicans,  which  took  the  name  of  Inde 
pendents,  and  received  the  nickname  of 
'Mugwumps."  The  revolt  was  serious  in 

its  consequences,  and  after  the  most  exciting 

-»o'-/>    ™        i       i  -I      L    -i  Grover  Cleveland 

3ontest  since  18<o,  Cleveland  was  elected. 

543.  Public  Measures  adopted  during  1885-1889.  —  Widely  as 
}he  parties  differed  on  many  questions,  Democrats,  Repub 
licans,  and  oSationalists  agreed  in  demanding  certain  reform 
measures  which  were  now  carried   out.     In  1885  an  Anti- 
Contract-Labor  law  was  enacted,  forbidding  any  person,  com 
pany,  or  corporation  to  bring  any  aliens  into  the  United  States 
under  contract  to  perform  labor  or  service.     In  1887  cam 3  the 
Interstate   Commerce  Act,   placing  the   railroads   under  the 
supervision  of   commissioners  whose  duty  it  is   to  see  that 
all  charges  for  the  transportation  of  passengers  and  freight  are 
"reasonable  and  just,"  and  that  no  special  rates,  rebates,  draw 
backs,  or  unjust  discriminations  are  made  for  one  shipper  over 
another.     In  1888  a  second  Chinese  Exclusion  Act  prohibited 
the  return  of  any  Chinese  laborer  who  had  once  left  the  coun 
try.     That  same  year  a  Department  of  Labor  was  established 
and  put  in  charge  of  a  commissioner.     His  duty  is  to  "diffuse 
among  the  people  of  the  United  States  useful  information  on 
subjects  connected  with  labor." 

544.  Political  Issues  since  1888.  — Thus  by  the  end  of  Mr. 
Cleveland's  first  term  many  of  the  demands  of  the  working- 

McM.  HIST.— 26 


466  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

men  had  been  granted,  and  laws  enacted  for  their  relief. 
These  issues  disposed  of,  a  new  set  arose,  and  after  1888 
financial  questions  took  the  place  of  labor  issues. 

545.  The  Surplus  and  the  Tariff.  —  These  financial  problems 
were  brought  up  by  the  condition  of  the  public  debt.     For 
twenty  years  past  the  debt  had  been  rapidly  growing  less 
and  less,  till  on  December  1,  1887,  it  was  $1,665,000,000,  a 
reduction  of  more  than  §1,100,000,000  in  twenty-one  years. 
By  that  time  every  bond  of  the  United  States  that  could  be 
called  in  and  paid  at  its  face  value  had  been  canceled.     As 
all  the  other  bonds  fell  due,  some  in  1891  and  others  in  1907, 
the  government  must  either  buy  them  at  high  rates,  or  suffer 
them  to  run.     If  it  suffered  them  to  run,  a  great  surplus  would 
pile  up  in  the  Treasury.     Thus  on  December  1,  1887,  after 
every  possible  debt  of  the  government  was  met,  there  was  a 
surplus  of  $50,000,000.     Six  months  later  (June  1,  1888)  the 
sum  had  increased  to  $103,000,000. 

Unless  this  was  to  go  on,  and  the  money  of  the  country  be 
locked  up  in  the  Treasury,  one  of  three  things  must  be  done : 

1.  More  bonds  must  be  bought  at  high  rates. 

2.  Or  the  revenue  must  be  reduced  by  reducing  taxation. 

3.  Or  the  surplus  must  be  distributed  among  the  states  as  in 

1837,  or  spent. 

546.  The  Mills  Tariff  Bill.  — Each  plan  had  its  advocates. 
But  the  Democrats,  who  controlled  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives,  attempted  to  solve  the  problem  by  cutting  down  the 
revenue,  and  passed  a  tariff  bill,  called  the  Mills  Bill,  after 
its  chief  author,  Mr.  R.  Q.  Mills  of  Texas.     The  Republicans 
declared  it  was  a  free-trade  measure  and  defeated  it  in  the 
Senate. 

547.  The  Campaign  of  1888 ;  Benjamin  Harrison,  Twenty-third 
President.  —  In  the  party  platforms  of  1888  we  find,  therefore, 
that  three  issues  are  prominent:    (1)  taxation,   (2)  tariff  re 
form,   (3)  the   surplus.     The   Democrats    nominated   Grover 
Cleveland  and  Allen  G.  Thurman,  and  demanded  frugality  in 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  467 

public  expenses,  no  more  revenue  than  was  needed  to  pay  the 
necessary  cost  of  government,  and  a  tariff  for  revenue  only. 
The  Kepublicans  nominated  Benjamin  Har 
rison  and  Levi  P.  Morton,  and  demanded  a 
tariff  for  protection,  a  reduction  of  the 
revenue  by  the  repeal  of  taxes  on  tobacco 
and  on  spirits  used  in  the  arts,  and  by  the 
admission  free  of  duty  of  foreign-made  arti 
cles  the  like  of  which  are  not  produced  at 
home.  -.  ~-<«ra 

The    Prohibitionists,    the    Union    Labor 
party,    and  'the   United   Labor   party   also 
placed  candidates  in  the  field.     Harrison  and  Morton  were 
elected,  and  inaugurated  March  4,  1889. 

548.  The  Republicans  in  Control.  —  The  Republican  party  not 
only  regained  the  presidency,  but  was  once  more  in  control  of 
the  House  and  Senate.     Thus  free  to  carry  out  its  pledges, 
it  passed   the  McKinley  Tariff  Act  (1890) ;    a  new  pension 
bill,  which  raised  the  number  of  pensioners  to  970,000,  and 
the  sum  annually  spent  on  pensions  from  $106,000,000  to 
§150,000,000;  and  a  new  financial  measure,  known  as 

549.  The  Sherman  Act.  —  You  remember  that  the  attempt  to 
enact  a  law  for  the  free  coinage  of  silver  in  1878  led  to  the 
Bland-Allison  Act  (see  p.  449),  for  the  purchase  of  bullion 
and  the  coinage  of  at  least  $2,000,000  worth  of  silver  each 
month.     As  this  was  not  free  coinage,  the  friends  of  silver 
made  a  second  attempt,  in  1886,  to  secure  the  desired  legisla 
tion.     This  also  failed.     But  in  the  summer  of  1890,  the  silver 
men,  having  a  majority  of  the  Senate,  passed  a  free-coinage 
bill  (June  17),  which  the  House  rejected  (June  25).     A  con 
ference  followed,  and  from  this  conference  came  a  bill  which 
was  quickly  enacted  into  a  law  and  called  the  Sherman  Act. 
It  provided 

1.    That  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  should  buy  4,500,000 
ounces  of  silver  each  month. 


468  THE    ECONOMIC    STRUGGLE 

2.  That  lie  should  pay  for  the  bullion  with  paper  money  called 

treasury  notes. 

3.  That  on  demand  of  the  holder  the  Secretary  must  redeem 

these  notes  in  gold  or  silver. 

4.  After  July  1,    1891,  the  silver  need  not  be  coined,  but 

might  be  stored  in  the  Treasury,  and  silver  certificates 
issued. 

550.  The  Farmers'  Alliance.  —  This  legislation,  combined  with 
an  agricultural  depression  and  widespread  discontent  in  the 
agricultural  states,  caused  the  defeat  of  the  Republicans  in 
the  elections  of  1890.  The  Democratic  minority  of  21  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  of  the  Fifty-first  Congress  was 
turned  into  a  Democratic  majority  of  135  in  the  Fifty-second. 
Eight  other  members  were  elected  by  the  Farmers'  Alliance. 

For  twenty  years  past  the  farmers  in  every  great  agricultural 
state  had  been  organizing,  under  such  names  as  Patrons  of 
Husbandry,  Farmers'  League,  the  Grange,  Patrons  of  Industry, 
Agricultural  Wheel,  Farmers'  Alliance.  Their  object  was  to 
promote  sociability,  spread  information  concerning  agriculture 
and  the  price  of  grain  and  cattle,  and  guard  the  interests  and 
welfare  of  the  farmer  generally.  By  1886  many  of  these  began 
to  unite,  and  the  National  Agricultural  Wheel  of  the  United 
States,  the  Farmers'  Alliance  and  Cooperative  Union  of 
America,  and  several  more  came  into  existence.  In  1889  the 
amalgamation  was  carried  further  still,  and  at  a  convention 
in  St.  Louis  they  were  all  practically  united  in  the  Farmers' 
Alliance  and  Industrial  Union. 

The  purpose  of  this  alliance  was  political,  and  as  its  strong 
hold  was  Kansas,  the  contest  began  in  that  state  in  1890.  At 
a  convention  of  Alliance  men  and  Knights  of  Labor,  a  "  Peo 
ple's  Party  "  was  formed,  which  elected  a  majority  of  the  state 
legislature.  Five  out  of  seven  Congressmen  were  secured,  and 
one  United  States  senator.  Before  Congress  met  (in  Decem 
ber,  1891),  another  member  of  the  House  was  elected  elsewhere, 
and  three  more  senators.  The  support  of  fifty  other  repre- 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  4t>9 

seutatives  was  claimed.  Greatly  elated  over  this  important 
footing,  the  Alliance  men  marked  out  a  plan  for  congressional 
legislation.  They  demanded 

1.  A  bill  for  the  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver. 

2.  The  subtreasury  scheme. 

3.  A  Land  Mortgage  Bill. 

551.  The  Subtreasury  Plan  of  the  Alliance  Party. — The  idea 
at  the  base  of  these  demands  was  that  the  amount  of  money  in 
circulation  must  be  increased,  and  loaned  to  the  people  without 
the  aid  of  banks  or  capitalists.     It  was  proposed,  therefore, 
that  the  government  should  establish  a  number  of  subtreasury 
or  money-loaning  stations  in  each  state,  at  which  the  farmers 
could  borrow  money  from  the  government  (at  two  per  cent 
interest),  giving  as  security  non-perishable  farm  produce. 

552.  The  Land  Mortgage  Scheme  provided  that  any  owner  of 
from  10  to  320  acres  of  land,  at  least  half  of  which  was  under 
cultivation,  might  borrow  from  the  government  treasury  notes 
equal  to  half  the  assessed  value  of  the  land  and  buildings. 

553.  The  People's  Party  organized.  —  That  either  of  the  old 
parties  would  further  such  schemes  was  far  from  likely.     A 
cry  was  therefore  raised  by  the  most  ardent  Alliance  men  for 
a  third  party,  and  at   a  conference  of  Alliance   and   Labor 
leaders  in  May,  1891,  a  new  national  party  was  founded,  and 
named  "  The  People's  Party  of  the  United  States  of  America." 

554.  Party  Candidates  in  1892.  —  When  the  campaign  opened 
in  1892  there  were  thus  four  parties  in  the  field.     The  People's 
party  nominated  James  B.  Weaver  and  James  G.  Field.     The 
platform  called  for 

1.  The  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver  and  gold  at  the 

ratio  of  16  to  1. 

2.  A  graduated  income  tax. 

3.  Government  ownership  of  railroads,  telegraphs,  and  tele 

phones. 

4.  The  restriction  of  immigration. 


470  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

5.  A  national  currency  to  be  loaned  to  the  people  at  two  per 

cent  interest  per  annum,  secured  by  land  or  produce. 

6.  All  land  held  by  aliens,  or  by  railroads  in  excess  of  their 

actual  needs,  to  be  reclaimed  and  held  for  actual  settlers. 

The  Prohibitionists  nominated  John  Bidwell  and  J.  B.  Cran- 
fill,  and  declared  "  anew  for  the  entire  suppression  of  the 
manufacture,  sale,  importation,  exportation,  and  transportation 
of  alcoholic  liquors  as  a  beverage." 

The  Democratic  party  selected  Grover  Cleveland  for  the 
third  time  and  chose  Adlai  E.  Stevenson  for  Vice  President. 
The  platform  condemned  trusts  and  combines,  advocated  the 
reclamation  of  the  public  lands  from  corporations  and  syndi 
cates,  the  exclusion  of  the  Chinese  and  of  the  criminals  and 
paupers  of  Europe,  denounced  "  the  Sherman  Act  of  1890,"  and 
called  for  "the  coinage  of  both  gold  and  silver  without  dis 
criminating  against  either  metal  or  charge  for  mintage,"  with 
"  the  dollar  unit  of  coinage  of  both  metals  "  "  of  equal  intrinsic 
and  exchangeable  value." 

The  Republicans  nominated  Benjamin  Harrison  and  Whitelaw 
Reid,  expressed  their  sympathy  with  the  cause  of  temperance, 
their  opposition  to  trusts,  and  called  for  the  coinage  of  both  gold 
and  silver  in  such  way  that  "  the  debt-paying  power  of  the  dol 
lar,  whether  silver,  gold,  or  paper,  shall  be  at  all  times  equal." 

555.  Grover  Cleveland  reflected.  —  The  election  was  a  complete 
triumph  for  the  Democratic  party.  Mr.  Cleveland  was  again 
elected,  and  for  the  first  time  since  1861  the  House,  Senate, 
and  President  were  all  three  Democratic. 

Mr.  Cleveland  was  inaugurated  March  4, 1893.  Never  in  its 
history  had  the  country  been  seemingly  more  prosperous ;  the 
crops  were  bountiful;  business  was  nourishing,  manufactures 
were  thriving.  But  the  prosperity  was  not  real.  Business  was 
inflated,  and  during  the  following  summer  an  industrial  and 
financial  panic  which  had  long  been  brewing  swept  over  the 
business  world,  wrecking  banks  and  destroying  industrial  and 
commercial  establishments. 


POLITICS  SINCE   1880  471 

To  understand  what  now  happened,  two  facts  must  be 
remembered : 

1.  Under  the  Resumption  of  Specie  Payment  Act  of  1875 

(see  p.  446),  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  was  author 
ized  to  buy  specie  by  the  issue  of  bonds  and  keep  it  to 
redeem  United  States  notes. 

2,  In  May,  1878,  it  was  ordered  that  when  a  greenback  was 

redeemed  in  specie,  it  should  "  not  be  retired,  canceled, 
or  destroyed,  but  shall  be  reissued  and  paid  out  again 
and  kept  in  circulation."  There  were  then  $346,681,000 
in  greenbacks  unredeemed. 

556.  The  Gold  Reserve.  —  Meantime,  under  the  law  of  1875, 
and  before  January  1,  1879,  the  secretary  issued  $95,500,000 
in  bonds,  the  proceeds  of  which,  with  other  gold  then  in  the 
Treasury,  made  a  fund  deemed  sufficient  to  redeem  such  notes 
as  were  likely  to  be  presented.  This  has  since  been  called 
our  gold  reserve,  and  has  been  fixed-  by  the  secretaries  at 
$100,000,000.  January  1,  1879,  the  reserve  was  $114,000,000, 
and  though  it  often  rose  and  fell,  it  never  went  below  that 
amount  till  July,  1892.  By  that  time  there  were  other  gold 
obligations.  The  silver  purchased  under  the  law  of  1890 
was  paid  for  with  notes  exchangeable  for  "  coin " ;  but  as  the 
secretaries  always  construed  "  coin  "  to  mean  gold,  and  as  by 
1893  these  notes  amounted  to  $150,000,000,  our  gold  obli 
gations — that  is,  notes  exchangeable  for  gold — were  nearly 
$500,000,000  (greenbacks,  $346,000,000;  silver  purchase  notes, 
$150,000,000).  This  immense  and  steadily  increasing  sum 
caused  a  doubt  of  our  ability  to  pay  in  gold,  and  a  fear  that 
we  might  be  forced  to  pay  in  silver.  Now  silver,  since  1873, 
had  fallen  steadily  in  value  from  $1.30  an  ounce  to  $0.81  an 
ounce  in  1893,  so  that  the  bullion  value  of  a  silver  dollar  was 
about  67  cents.  The  fear,  then,  that  our  debts  might  be  paid 
in  silver  (1)  led  foreigners  to  cease  investing  money  in  this 
country,  and  to  send  our  stocks  and  bonds  home  to  be  sold, 
and  (2)  led  people  in  this  country  to  draw  gold  out  of  the 


x  * 

472  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

banks  and  the  Treasury  and  hoard  it,  so  that  in  April,  1893, 
the  gold  reserve,  for  the  first  time  since  it  was  created,  fell 
below  $100,000,000  (to  $97,000,000). 

557.  The  Panic  of  1893.  —  Business  depression  and  "tight 
money"  followed.     Over  three  hundred  banks  suspended  or 
failed,  manufactories  all  over  the  country  shut  down,  and  a 
period  of  great  distress  set  in.     People,  alarmed  at  the  condi 
tion  of  the  banks,   began  to  draw  their  deposits  and  hoard 
them,  thereby  causing  such  a  scarcity  of  bills  of  small  denomi 
nations  that  a  "  currency  famine  "  was  threatened. 

558.  The  Purchase  of  Silver  stopped.  —  Believing  that  the  fear 
that  we  should  soon  be  "on  a  silver  basis"  had  much  to  do 
with  this  state  of  affairs,  and  that  the  compulsory  purchase  of 
silver  each  month  had  much  to  do  with  the  fear,  the  President 
assembled  Congress  in  special  session,  August  7,  and  asked  for 
the  repeal  of  that  clause  of  the  Sherman  Act  of  1890  (see 
p.  467)  which  required  a  monthly  purchase  of  silver.     After 
a  struggle  in  which  both  of  the  old  parties  were  split,  the  com 
pulsory  purchase  clause  was  repealed,  November  1,  1893. 

559.  The  Silver  Movement.  —  The  steady  fall  in  the  bullion 
value  of  silver  was  a  serious  blow  to  the  prosperity  of  the 
great   silver-producing   states,  —  Colorado,    Montana,    Idaho, 
South  Dakota,  Wyoming,  Nevada,   Utah,  and  the  territories 
of  Arizona  and  New  Mexico,  —  where  silver  mining  was  "  the 
very  heart  from  which  every  other  industry  receives  support." 
In  Colorado  alone  15,000  miners  were  made  idle.      To  the 
people  of  this  section,  some  2,000,000  in  number,  the  silver 
question  was  of  vital  importance ;   and,  alarmed  at  the  call 
for  the  special  session  of  Congress  and  the  possible  repeal  of 
the  silver-purchase  clause,  they  held  a  convention  at  Denver, 
with  a  view  to   affecting   public   sentiment.      A   few   weeks 
after,  the  National  Bimetallic  League  met  at  Chicago.     Both 
opposed  the   repeal,  and  demanded  that  if   the  goverrment 
ceased  to  buy  silver,  the  mints  should  be  opened  to  free  coin 
age.     This  the  friends  of  silver  in  the  Senate  attempted  in 
vain  to  bring  about. 


560.  The  Industrial  Depression ;  the  Wilson  Bill.  —  The  indus 
trial  revival  which  it  was  hoped  would  follow  the  repeal  of 
the  silver-purchase  law  did  not  take  place.      Prices  did  not 
rise ;  failures  continued ;  the  long-silent  mills  did  not  reopen ; 
gold  continued  to  leave  the   country,  imports   fell   off,  and, 
when  the  year  ended,  the  receipts  of  the  government  were 
$34,000,000  behind  the  expenditures.      With  this  condition 
of  the  Treasury  facing  it,  Congress  met  in  December,  1893. 
The  Democrats  were  in  control,  and  pledged   to   revise   the 
tariff;    and  true  to  the  pledge,  William  L.  Wilson  of  West 
Virginia,  Chairman  of  the  House  Committee   on  Ways   and 
Means,  presented  a  new  tariff  bill  (the  Wilson  Bill)  which 
after  prolonged  debate  passed  both  Houses  and  became  a  law 
at  midnight,  August  27,  1894,  without  the  President's  signa 
ture.     As  it  was  expected  that  the  revenue  yielded  would  not 
be  sufficient  to  meet  the  expenses  of  government,  one  section 
of  the  law  provided  for  a  tax  of  two  per  cent  on  all  incomes 
above  $4000.     This  the  Supreme  Court  afterwards  declared 
unconstitutional. 

561.  The  Bond  Issues.  —  We  have  seen  that  in  April,  1893, 
the  gold  reserve  fell  to  $97,000,000.     But  it  did  not  stop 
there;    for,  the  business  depression  and  the  demand  for  the 
free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver  continuing,  the  with 
drawal  of   gold  went   on,    till  the  reserve  was   so  low  that 
bonds  were  repeatedly  sold  for  gold  wherewith  to  maintain 
it.     In  this  wise,  during  1894-95,  $262,000,000  were  added 
to  our  bonded  debt. 

562.  Foreign    Relations;    the    Hawaiian   Revolution. —When 
Cleveland  took  office,  a  treaty  providing  for  the  annexation  of 
the  Hawaiian  Islands  was  pending  in  the  Senate.     In  Janu 
ary,  1893,  these  islands  were  the  scene  of  a  revolution,  which 
deposed  the  Queen  and  set  up  a  "provisional  government." 
Commissioners  were  then  dispatched  to  Washington,  where 
a  treaty  of  annexation  was  negotiated  and  (February  15)  sent 
to  the  Senate  for  approval.     In  the  course  of  the  revolution, 
a  force  of  men  from  the  United  States  steamer  Boston  was 


474  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

landed  at  the  request  of  the  revolutionary  leaders,  and  our 
flag  was  raised  over  some  of  the  buildings.  When  these  facts 
became  known,  the  President,  fearing  that  the  presence  of 
United  States  marines  might  have  contributed  much  to  the 
success  of  the  revolution,  recalled  the  treaty  from  the  Senate, 
and  sent  an  agent  to  the  islands  to  investigate.  His  report 
set  forth  in  substance  that  the  revolution  would  never  have 
taken  place  had  it  not  been  for  the  presence  and  aid  of  United 
States  marines,  and  that  the  Queen  had  practically  been  de 
posed  by  United  States  officials.  A  new  minister  was  there 
upon  sent,  with  instructions  to  announce  that  the  treaty  of 
annexation  would  not  be  confirmed,  and  to  seek  for  the  resto 
ration  of  the  Queen  on  certain  conditions.  But  President 
Dole  of  the  Hawaiian  republic  denied  the  right  of  Cleveland 
to  impose  conditions,  or  in  any  way  interfere  in  the  domestic 
concerns  of  Hawaii,  and  refused  to  surrender  to  the  Queen. 

563.  The  Venezuelan  Boundary  Dispute.  —  During  1895,  the 
boundary  dispute  which  had  been  dragging  on  for  more  than 
half  a  century  between  Great  Britain  and  Venezuela,  reached 
what  the  President  called  "an  acute  stage,"  and  made  neces 
sary  a  statement  of  the  position  of  the  United  States  under 
the  Monroe  Doctrine.  Great  Britain  was  therefore  informed 
"that  the  established  policy  of  the  United  States  is  against  a 
forcible  increase  of  any  territory  of  a  European  power  "  in  the 
New  World,  and  "  that  the  United  States  is  bound  to  protest 
against  the  enlargement  of  the  area  of  British  Guiana  against 
the  will  of  Venezuela";  and  she  was  invited  to  submit  her 
claims  to  arbitration.  Her  answer  was  that  the  Monroe  Doc 
trine  was  "inapplicable  to  the  state  of  things  in  which  we  live 
at  the  present  day "  and  a  refusal  to  submit  her  claims  to 
arbitration.  The  President  then  asked  and  received  authority 
to  appoint  a  commission  to  examine  the  boundary  and  report. 
"When  such  report  is  made  and  accepted,"  said  Cleveland, 
"it  will  in  my  opinion  be  the  duty  of  the  United  States  to 
resist  by  every  means  in  its  power,  as  a  willful  aggression 
upon  its  rights  and  interests,  the  appropriation  by  Great  Brit- 


POLITICS   SINCE   1880  475 

ain  of  any  lands,  or  the  exercise  of  any  governmental  juris 
diction,  over  any  territory  which  after  investigation  we  have 
determined  of  right  belongs  to  Venezuela."  For  a  time  the 
excitement  this  message  aroused  in  Great  Britain  and  our  own 
country  was  extreme.  But  it  soon  subsided,  and  on  February 
2,  1897,  a  treaty  of  arbitration  was  signed  at  Washington 
between  Great  Britain  and  Venezuela. 

564.  The  Election  of  1896. — By  that  time  the  presidential 
election  was  over.  When  in  the  spring  the  time  came  to 
choose  delegates  to  the  party  nominating  conventions,  the 
drift  of  public  sentiment  was  so  strong  against  the  adminis 
tration,  that  it  seemed  certain  that  the  Republicans  would 
"sweep  the  country."  Little  interest,  therefore,  was  taken 
by  the  Democrats,  while  the  Republicans  were  most  concerned 
in  the  question  whether  Mr.  McKinley  or  Mr.  Reed  should  be 
their  presidential  candidate.  But  as  delegates  were  chosen 
by  the  Democrats  in  the  Western  and  Southern  States,  it  be 
came  certain  that  the  issue  was  to  be  the  free  and  unlimited 
coinage  of  silver  and  goVl  at  the  ratio  of  16  to  1. 

The  Republican  convention  met  in  June,  nominated  Wil 
liam  McKinley  and  Garret  A.  Hobart,  and  declared  the  party 
"  opposed  to  the  free  coinage  of  silver  except  by  international 
agreement,"  whereupon  twenty-one  delegates  representing  the 
silver  states  (Colorado,  Idaho,  Montana,  Nevada,  South  Da 
kota,,  and  Utah)  seceded  from  the  party.  The  Democratic 
convention  assembled  early  in  July,  and  after  a  most  exciting 
session  chose  William  J.  Bryan  and  Arthur  Sewall,  and  de 
clared  for  "the  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  both  silver  and 
gold  at  the  present  legal  ratio  of  16  to  1,  without  waiting  for 
the  aid  or  consent  of  any  other  nation."  A  great  defection 
followed  this  declaration,  scores  of  newspapers  refused  to 
support  the  candidates,  and  in  September  a  convention  of 
"gold  Democrats,"  taking  the  name  of  the  National  Demo 
cratic  party,  nominated  John  M.  Palmer  and  Simon  B. 
Buckner,  on  a  "gold  standard"  platform. 

Meanwhile,  the  Prohibitionists,  the  National  party  (declar- 


476  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUGGLE 

ing  for  woman  suffrage,  prohibition,  government  ownership 
of  railroads  and  telegraphs,  an  income  tax,  and  the  election  of 
the  President,  Vice  President,  and  senators  by  direct  vote 
of  the  people)^  the  Socialist  Labor  party,  the  Silver  party, 
and  the  Populists,  had  all  put  candidates 
in  the  field.  The  Silver  party  indorsed 
Bryan  and  Sewall;  the  Populists  nomi 
nated  Bryan  and  Thomas  E.  Watson, 

565.  McKinley,  President.  —  An  "  edu 
cational  campaign "  was  carried  on  with 
a  seriousness  never  before  approached  in 
our  history,  and  resulted  in  the  election 
of  Mr.  McKinley.  He  was  inaugurated 

on   March  4.  and  immediately   called  a 
William  McKinley  .  -  . 

special  session  of  Congress  to  revise  the 

tariff,  a  work  which  ended  in  the  enactment  of  the  "  Dingley 
Tariff,"  on  July  24,  1897. 

566.  The  Cuban  Question.  —  Absorbing  as  were  the  election 
and  the  tariff,  there  was  another  matter,  which  for  two  years 
past   had  steadily   grown  more   and  more   serious.     In   Feb 
ruary,  1895,  the  natives  of  Cuba  for  the  sixth  time  in  fifty 
years   rebelled   against  the  misrule  of  Spain  and  founded  a 
republic.     A  cruel,  bloody,  and  ruinous  war  followed,  and  as 
it  progressed,  deeply  interested   the   people  of   our   country. 
The  island  lay  at  our  very  doors.     Upwards  of  $50,000,000 
of  American   money  were    invested  in   mines,  railroads,  and 
plantations  there.      Our  yearly  trade  with  Cuba  was  valued 
at  $96,000,000.     Our  ports  were  used  by  Cubans  in  fitting  out 
military  expeditions,  which  the  government  was  forced  to  stop 
at  great  expense. 

567.  :NShall  Cuba  be  given  Belligerent  Rights  ?  — These  mat 
ters  were  serious,  and  'when  to  them  was  added  the  sympathy  we 
always  feel  for  any  people  struggling  for  the  liberty  we  enjoy, 
there  seemed  to  be  ample  reason  for  our  insisting  that  Spain 
should  govern  Cuba  better  or  set  her  free.     Some  thought  we 
should  buy  Cuba;  some  that  we  should  recognize  the  liepub 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  477 

lie  of  Cuba;  others  that  we  should  intervene  even  at  the  risk 
of  war.  Thus  urged  on,  Congress  in  1896  declared  that  the 
Cubans  were  entitled  to  belligerent  rights  in  our  ports,  and 
asked  the  President  to  endeavor  to  persuade  Spain  to  recog 
nize  the  independence  of  Cuba;  and  the  House  in  1897 
recommended  that  the  independence  of  Cuba  be  recognized. 
But  nothing  came  of  either  recommendation,  and  so  the  matter 
stood  when  McKinley  was  inaugurated. 

During  the  summer  of  1897  matters  grew  worse.  A  large 
part  of  the  island  became  a  wilderness.  The  people  who  had 
been  driven  into  the  towns  by  order  of  Captain  General  Wey- 
ler,  the  "reconcentrados,"  were  dying  of  starvation,  and  our 
countrymen,  deeply  moved  at  their  suffering,  began  to  send 
them  food  and  medical  aid. 

568.  The  Maine  destroyed.  — While  engaged  in  this  humane 
work  they  were  horrified  to  hear  that  on  the  night  of  Febru 
ary  15,  1898,  our  battleship  Maine  was  blown  up  in  the  harbor 
of  Havana,  and  260  of  her  sailors  killed.     Although  our  Court 
of  Inquiry  was  unable  to  fix  the  responsibility  for  the  explo 
sion,  many  people  believed  that  it  had  been  perpetrated  by 
Spaniards,  and  the  hope  of  a  peaceable  settlement  of  the  Cuban 
question  rapidly  waned.     The  sum  of  $50,000,000  was  voted 
to  the  President  for  strengthening  our  defenses  and  buying 
ships  and  munitions  of  war.     After  declining  to  recognize  the 
Cuban  Republic,  Congress  adopted  a  resolution,  on  April  19, 
declaring  for  the  freedom   of  Cuba,    demanding  that  Spain 
should  withdraw  from  the  island,  and  authorizing  the  Presi 
dent  to  compel  her  withdrawal,  if  necessary,  by  means  of  our 
army  and  navy.     Spain  severed  diplomatic  relations  with  us 
on  April  21,  and  the  war  began  on  that  date,  as  declared  by 
an  Act  of  Congress  a  few  days  later.     Two  hundred  thousand 
volunteers  were    quickly   enlisted,    out   of   the   much    larger 
number  that  wished  to  serve. 

569.  War  with  Spain  —  The  Battle  of  Manila.  —  While  one 
fleet  which  had  long  been  gathering  at  Key  West  went  off  and 
blockaded  Havana  and   other   parts   of   the   coast  of  Cuba, 


478 


THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 


Admiral  Dewey 


another,  under  Commodore  George  Dewey,  sailed  from  Hong 
kong  to  attack  the  Spanish  fleet  at  the  Philippine  Islands. 
Dewey  found  it  in  the  Bay  of  Manila,  where,  on  May  1,  1898, 

he  fought  and  won  the  most  bril 
liant  naval  battle  in  the  world's 
history.  Passing  the  forts  at 
the  entrance,  he  entered  the  bay, 
and,  without  the  loss  of  a  man 
or  a  ship,  he  destroyed  the 
entire  Spanish  fleet  of  ten  ves 
sels,  killed  and  wounded  over 
600  men,  and  captured  the  arse 
nal  at  Cavite  (cah-ve-ta')  and  the 
forts  at  the  entrance  to  the  bay. 
The  city  of  Manila  was  then 
blockaded  by  Dewey's  fleet,  and  General  Merritt  with  20,000 
troops  was  sent  across  the  Pacific  to  take  possession  of  the 
Philippines,  which  had  long  been  Spain's  most  important  pos 
session  in  the  East.  For  his  great 
victory  Dewey  received  the  thanks 
of  Congress  and  was  promoted  to  be 
Rear-Admiral,  and  later  was  given 
for  life  the  full  rank  of  Admiral. 

570.  The  Destruction  of  Cervera's 
Fleet  —  Capture  of  Santiago.  —  Mean 
time  a  second  Spanish  fleet,  under 
Admiral  Cervera,  sailed  from  the 
Cape  Verde  Islands.  Acting  Eear- 
Admiral  Sampson,  with  ships  which 
had  been  blockading  Havana,  and 
Commodore  Schley,  with  a  Flying 

Squadron,  went  in  search  of  Cervera,  and  after  a  long  hunt 
he  was  found  in  the  harbor  of  Santiago  de  Cuba  (sahn-te- 
ah'go  da  coo 'bah),  which  was  promptly  blockaded  by  the 
ships  of  both  squadrons,  with  Sampson  in  command.  The 
narrow  entrance  to  the  harbor  was  so  well  defended  by  forts 


Rear-Admiral  Sampson 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880 


479 


General  Shafter 


and  submarine  mines  that  a   direct   attack  on  Cervera  was 

impossible.     In  an  attempt  to  complete  the  blockade,  Naval 

Constructor  E.  P.  Hobson  and  a  volunteer  crew  of  seven  men 

took  the  collier  Merrimac  to  the 

harbor  entrance,  and,  amid  a  rain 

of  shot  and  shell,  sank  her  in  the 

channel   (June  3).      The  gallant 

little  band  escaped  with  life,  but 

were  made  prisoners  of  war,  and 

in  time  were  exchanged. 

The  capture  of  Santiago  was 
decided  upon  when  Cervera  sought 
refuge  in  its  harbor,  and  about 
18, 000  men  (mostly  of  the  regular 
army),  under  General  Shafter, 
were  hurried  to  Cuba  and  landed 
a  few  miles  from  the  city.  On 

July  1  the  enemy's  outer  line  of  defenses  were  taken,  after 
severe  fighting  at  El  Caney  (ca-naf)  and  San  Juan  (sahn  hoo- 

ahn');  and  on  the  next  day  the 
Spaniards  failed  in  an  attempt  to 
retake  them.  So  certain  was  it 
that  the  city  must  soon  surrender, 
that  Cervera  was  ordered  to  dash 
from  the  harbor,  break  through 
the  American  fleet,  and  put  to 
sea.  On  Sunday  morning,  July  3, 
the  attempt  was  made ;  a  desperate 
sea  fight  followed,  and,  in  a  few 
hours,  all  six  of  the  Spanish  ves 
sels  were  sunk  or  stranded,  shat 
tered  wrecks,  on  the  coast  of  Cuba. 
The  Spanish  loss  in  killed  and  wounded  was  heavy,  while 
Admiral  Cervera  and  about  1800  of  his  men  were  taken  pris 
oners.  Not  one  of  our  vessels  was  seriously  damaged,  and  but 
one  of  our  men  was  killed.  When  the  battle  began,  the 


Rear-Admiral  Schley 


480 


THE   ECONOMIC   STRUGGLE 


American  war  ships  were  in  their  usual  positions  before  the 
harbor,  as  assigned  them  by  Admiral  Sampson;  but  Sampson 
himself,  in  his  flagship,  was  several  miles  to  the  east  on  his 
way  to  a  conference  with  General  Shafter.  Commodore^ 
Schley's  flagsjiip,  the  Brooklyn,  was  at  the  west  end  of  the 
Lne,  and  as /the  enemy  tried  to  escape  in  that  direction,  she 

J£s  in  tlw  thickest  of  the  fight.  Another  war  ship  which 
^jpeciall^ytiistinguished  her-seif-was  the  Oregon,  a  AVestern- 

ship,  which  had  sailed  from 
rancisco  all  the  way  around 
Cape  ^Horn  in  order  to  reach  the 
seat  of  war. 

After  the  naval  battle  of  July  3, 
all  hope  of  successful  resistance 
by  the  Spaniards  vanished,  and  on 
July  14,  General  Toral  surren 
dered  Santiago,  the  eastern  end 
of  Cuba,  and  an  army  of  nearly 
25,000  men.  A  week  later  Gen 
eral  Miles  set  off  to  seize  the  is 
land  of  Pjorto  Rico.  He  landed  on  the  southern  coast,  and  had 
occupied  much  of  the  island  when  hostilities  came  to  an 
end. 

571.  Peace. — On  August  12,  1898,  a  protocol  was  signed 
by  representatives  of  the  two  nations,  providing  for  the  imme 
diate  cessation  of  hostilities,  the  withdrawal  of  Spain  from 
the  West  Indies,  and  the  occupation  of  Manila  by  the  United 
States  till  the  conclusion  of  a  treaty  of  peace,  which  was  to 
be  negotiated  by  a  commission  meeting  in  Paris,  and  which 
was  to  provide  for  the  disposition  of  the  Philippines. 

News  of  the  cessation  of  hostilities  was  instantly  sent  to 
all  our  fleets  and  armies.  But,  on  August  13,  before  word 
could  reach  the  Philippines,  Manila  was  attacked  by  General 
Merritt's  army  and  Dewey's  fleet,  whereupon  the  Spanish 
general  surrendered  the  city  and  about  7000  soldiers. 

A  formal  treaty  of  peace  was  signed  at  Paris  December  10, 


General  Miles 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  481 

1898,  providing  that  Spain  should  relinquish  her  title  to  Cuba, 
and  cede  Porto  Rico,  Guam  (one  of  the  Ladrones),  and  the 
Philippines  to  the  United  States;  and  that  the  United  States 
should  pay  $20,000,000  to  Spain.     The  treaty  was  then  sub 
mitted  to  the  governments  of  the  United  States  and  Spain  for 
ratification;  but  in  both  countries  it  met  some  opposition.     In 
our  country  objections  were  made  especially  to  the  taking  of 
the  Philippines  without  the  consent  of  their  inhabitants,  many 
of  whom,  under  the  leadership  of  Aguinaldo,  had  previously 
rebelled   against   Spain  and  were  now  demanding  complete 
independence ;  but  the  prevailing  view  was  that  our  immedi 
ate  control  was  necessary  to  prevent  civil  war,  anarchy,  and 
foreign  complications  there.      Accordingly,    on  February  6, 

1899,  the  treaty  was  ratified  by  the  Senate  by  a  vote  of  57  to 
27.     Spain  also  accepted  the  treaty,  which  was  formally  pro 
claimed  April  11.     The  $20,000,000  was  promptly  paid  to 
Spain,  and  ordinary  diplomatic  relations  were  resumed. 

572.  The  War  Bonds  and  War  Taxes.  — For  the  expenses  of 
the  war  with  Spain  Congress  made  ample  provision.     The 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  was  authorized  to  issue  $400,000,- 
000   in  3  per  cent  bonds,1  and   borrow   $100,000,000   upon 
temporary   certificates   of    indebtedness.       Stamp    taxes,    an 
inheritance  tax,  and  a  duty  on  tea  were  laid,  and  the  silver  in 
the  Treasury  was  ordered  to  be  coined  at  the  rate  of  $1,500,000 
a  month. 

573.  Hawaii  annexed.  —  But  in  few  respects  was  the  effect 
of  the  war  so  marked  as  in  the  changed  sentiment  of  the  people 
toward  Hawaii.     During  five  years  the  little  republic  had  been 
steadily  seeking  annexation  to  the  United  States,  and  seeking 
in  vain.     But  with  the  partial  occupation  of  the  Philippines, 
and  the   impending   acquisition  of   Porto  Rico,  and  perhaps 
Cuba,  the  policy  of  territorial  expansion  lost  many  of  its  ter 
rors,    and    the    Hawaiian    Islands    were    annexed    by    joint 

1  -$200,000,000  of  the  war  bonds  were  offered  for  popular  subscription, 
and  $109,000,000  were  subscribed  in  sums^under  $500.  All  was  taken  in 
sums  under  $5000. 

McM.  HIST.      -J7. 


(482) 


POLITICS    SINCE    1880  483 

resolution  of  Congress,  signed  by  the  President  July  7,  1898. 
The  formal  transfer  of  sovereignty  took  place  August  V2.  The 
islands  continued  temporarily  under  their  existing  form  of 
government,  with  slight  modifications,  till  June  14, 1900,  when 
they  were  organized  as  a  territory. 

574.  The  War  in  the  Philippines.  —  While  the  treaty  with 
Spain  was  under  consideration,  the  city  of  Manila  was  held  by 
General  Otis,  Merritt's   successor;   but  native   troops,  undei 
Aguinaldo,  were   in   control  of   most   of   Luzon   and  several 
other  islands.     On  the  night  of   February  4,  1899,  the  long* 
threatened   conflict    between   them 

was  begun  by  Aguinaldo's  unsuc 
cessful  attack  on  the  Americans 
at  Manila.  War  now  followed ;  but 
in  battle  after  battle  the  natives 
were  beaten  and  scattered,  till  by 
the  beginning  of  the  year  1900  the 
main  army  of  the  Filipinos  had 
been  completely  broken  up,  and  the 
only  forces  still  opposing  American 
authority  were  small  bodies  of  General  Otis 

bandits  and  guerrillas.  These  held 
out  persistently,  and  continued  the  warfare  for  more  than  a 
year.  In  1900  the  President  sent  a  commission  to  the  Philip 
pines  to  organize  civil  government  in  such  localities  and  in  such 
degree  as  it  should  deem  advisable;  and  in  1902  Congress  en 
acted  a  plan  of  government  under  which  the  Philippines  are 
constituted  a  partly  self-governing  dependency. 

575.  Porto  Rico  and  Cuba.  —  After  the  close  of  the  Spanish 
war,  both  Porto  Rico  and  Cuba  remained  under  the  military 
control  of  the  United  States  for  many  months.     For  Porto 
Rico,  which  had  been  ceded  to  our  country,  Congress  provided 
a  system  of  civil  government  which  went  into  effect  May  1, 
1900.     This  organized  Porto  Rico  as  a  dependency. 

Cuba,  however,  had  not  been  ceded  to  the  United  States. 
It  had  passed  under  our  control  only  for  the  restoration  of 


484  THE    ECONOMIC    STRUGGLE 

peace  and  the  establish  men  t  uf  a  stable  government  there ;  for 
Congress,  in  its  resolution  of  April  19,  1898,  asserted  its 
determination,  after  the  pacification  of  Cuba,  "  to  leave  the 
government  and  control  of  the  island  to  its  people.''  In  June, 
1900,  the  local  city  governments  were  turned  over  to  municipal 
officers  that  had  been  elected  by  the  people.  In  the  following 
winter  a  constitution  was  framed  by  a  convention  of  delegates 
elected  by  the  Cubans.  Then,  after  certain  provisions  had 
been  added  to  this,  to  govern  the  future  relations  between 
Cuba  and  the  United  States,  and  after  the  first  officers  of  the 
Cuban  Republic  had  been  elected,  the  United  States  troops 
were  withdrawn  and  the  new  government  took  charge  of  the 
island,  May  20, 1902. 

576.  Disorders  in  China.  — Early  in  1900  a  patriotic  society 
of  Chinese,  called  the  Boxers,  began  to  massacre  native  Chris 
tians  in  the  north  of  China,  and  to  drive  out  or  kill  all  mission 
aries  and  other  foreigners.     The  disorder  soon  spread  to  Pekin, 
where  the  foreign  ministers  and  their  countrymen  (including 
some  Americans)  were  besieged  in  their  quarter  of  the  city  by 
Boxers  and  regular  Chinese  troops ;  for  the  Chinese  government, 
instead  of  suppressing  the  Boxers,  acted  in  sympathy  with  them. 

President  McKinley  sent  warships  and  soldiers  to  China, 
where  they  cooperated  with  the  forces  of  Japan  and  the  Euro 
pean  powers  in  rescuing  the  imperiled  foreigners  in  Pekin. 
War  was  not  declared  against  China,  though  she  resisted  the 
invading  troops,  making  it  necessary  for  them  to  capture 
several  towns  and  to  fight  several  battles  before  Pekin  was 
taken.  A  treaty  was  then  negotiated  with  the  United  States, 
Japan,  and  the  European  powers,  providing  for  the  restoration 
of  order  and  a  settlement  of  the  various  claims  against  China. 

577.  At  home  during  1900  our  population  was  counted ;  a 
President  was  elected ;  and  a  currency  law  of  much  importance 
was  enacted.      In  the  United  States  and  the  territories  there 
were  found  to  be  about  76,000,000  people,  and  in  the  one  state 
of  New  York  more  inhabitants  than  there  were  in  all  the  United 
States  in  1810. 


POLITICS   SINCE    1880  485 

By  the  currency  law,  known  as  the  Gold  Standard  Act,  it  is 
provided :  — 

1.  That  the  gold  dollar  shall  be  the  standard  unit  of  value. 

2.  That  all  forms  of  money  issued  or  coined  shall   be  kept 

"  at  a  parity  of  value  "  with  this  gold  standard. 

3.  That   United    States  notes   and    Treasury    notes  shall   be 

redeemed  in  gold  coin.      For  this  purpose  $150,000,000  of 
gold  coin  or  bullion  is  set  apart  in  the  Treasury. 

578.  When  the  time  came  to  prepare  for  the  election  of  a 
President  and  Vice  President,   eleven  conventions  were  held, 
as  many  platforms  were  framed,  and  eight  pairs  of  candidates 
were  nominated.     There  were  the  Democratic  and  Republican 
parties;    the   People's   Party    (Fusionists)    and   the   People's 
Party  (Middle  of  the  Road  Anti-Fusionists)  ;   the  Prohibition, 
United  Christian,  Silver  Republican,  Socialist  Labor,    Social 
Democratic,  and  National  parties ;    and  the  Anti-Imperialist 
League.     The  things  opposed,  approved  of,   or  demanded  by 
these  parties  were  many  and  various ;    but  a   few  should  be 
stated    as    showing   what   the   people   were   thinking    about : 
Trusts,  the  gold  standard,  the  free  coinage  of  silver,  a  canal 
across    Nicaragua    or   the   isthmus    of    Panama,   election   of 
United  States  senators  by  the  people,  repeal  of  the  war  taxes, 
statehood    for  the  territories,  independence  for  the  Filipinos, 
aid  to  American  shipping,  irrigation  of  the  arid  lands  in  the 
West,  public  ownership  of  railways  and  telegraphs,  desecra 
tion  of  the  Sabbath,  equality  of  men  and  women,  exclusion  of 
the  Asiatics,  the  Monroe  Doctrine. 

579.  McKinley  Reflected.  —  The  Populist  (Fusionist)  conven 
tion  nominated  William  J.  Bryan  and  Charles  A.  Towne.     But 
the  Democrats  named  Bryan  and  Adlai  E.  Stevenson.     There 
upon  Towne  withdrew,  and  Bryan  and  Stevenson  were  made 
the  candidates  of  the  Populists  and  the  Silver  party  as  well 
as  of  the  Democrats.     The   Democratic,    platform    denounced 
imperialism  and  trusts,  and  reiterated  the  demand  for  the  free 
coinage  of  silver  at  the  ratio  of  16  to  1.     The  Republicans 


486  THE   ECONOMIC    STRUGGLE 

renominated  President  McKinley,  and  nominated  Theodore 
Roosevelt  for  Vice  President,  on  a  platform  indorsing  McKin- 
ley's  administration  and  favoring  the  gold  standard  of  money. 
McKinley  and  Roosevelt  were  elected. 

580.  McKinley  Assassinated.  —  On  March  4,  1901,  the  Presi 
dent  began  his  second  term,  which  six  months  later  came  to  a 
dreadful  end.     In  May  a  great  fair  —  the  Pan-American  Expo 
sition  —  was  opened  at  Buffalo,  and   to    this   exposition   the 
President  came  as  a  guest  early  in  September,  and  was  holding 
a  public  reception  on  the  afternoon  of  the  6th,  when  an  anar 
chist  who  approached  as  if   to    shake  hands,   suddenly   shot 
him  twice.     For  several  days  it  was  thought  that  the  wounds 
would  not  prove  fatal ;  but  early  on  the  morning  of  the  14th,  the 
President  died,  and  that  afternoon  Mr.  Roosevelt  took  the  oath 
of  office  required  by  the  Constitution  and  became  President. 

581.  Public  Measures  adopted  since  1901.  —  The  events  con 
nected  with  our  large  island  possessions  had  directed  much 

attention  to  our  military  and  naval  forces. 
As  a  result,  Congress  passed  several  meas 
ures  to  increase  the  efficiency  of  the  army, 
and  appropriated  large  sums  for  additions 
to  the  navy.  For  the  reclamation  of  the 
arid  parts  of  the  Far  West  an  important 
law  was  enacted  (1902),  setting  aside  the 
money  received  from  the  sales  of  public 
land  in  that  part  of  the  country  and  appro- 
Theodore  Roosevelt  Plating  it  for  the  planning  and  construc 
tion  of  irrigation  works.  In  1903  a  ninth 
member  was  added  to  the  President's  cabinet  in  the  person  of 
the  Secretary  of  Commerce  and  Labor.  The  new  department 
was  made  to  include  the  Department  of  Labor  established 
fifteen  years  before,  and  a  number  of  other  bureaus  already 
existing;  at  the  same  time  the  Bureau  of  Corporations  was 
newly  established,  and  was  given  the  power  to  investigate 
the  organization  and  workings  of  any  trust  or  corporation 
(except  railroads)  engaged  in  interstate  or  foreign  commerce, 


POLITICS   SINCE   1880  487 

and,  with  the  President's  approval,  to  publish  the  information 
so  obtained. 

A  long-standing  dispute  as  to  the  eastern  boundary  of  south 
ern  Alaska  was  referred  to  a  British-American  tribunal,  which 
decided  chiefly  in  favor  of  the  United  States  (1903).  By  a 
reciprocity  treaty  writh  Cuba  which  went  into  effect  in  1904, 
the  duties  on  Cuban  trade  were  somewhat  lowered. 

582.  The  Isthmian  Canal.  —  A  French  company  many  years 
ago  began  to  dig  a  ship  canal  across  the  Isthmus  of  Panama, 
but  it  failed  through  bad  management  before  the  work  was 
half  done.     A  United  States  commission  made  a  survey  of  this 
route  and  also  of  the  Nicaragua  route  across  Central  America, 
estimated  the  cost  of  building  each  canal,  and  gave  careful 
consideration  to  the  advantages  of  each  route.     The  owners  of 
the  French  canal  having  offered  to  sell  for  $40,000,000,  Con 
gress  in'  1902  authorized  the  President  to  buy  and  complete  it, 
provided  satisfactory  title  and  permanent  control  of  the  route 
could  be  secured.     In  all,  about  $200,000,000  was  provided  for 
this  work.     In  1903  a  treaty  was  negotiated  with  Colombia, 
giving  the  United  States  a  permanent  lease  of  a  six-mile  strip 
across  the  isthmus,  for  an  annual  rental  of  $250,000  and  the 
payment   of   $10,000,000,  but   Colombia  rejected  the  treaty. 
The  Colombian  province  of  Panama  thereupon  seceded  (Novem 
ber  3),  and  its   independence  was   recognized  by  the  United 
States  and  other  nations.     A  treaty  was  soon  made  whereby 
the  United  States  guaranteed  the  independence  of  Panama, 
and  Panama  ceded  to  the  United  States  a  ten-mile  strip  across 
the  isthmus  for  the  sums  rejected  by  Colombia.     The  rights 
of  the  French  company  were  then  bought,  and  a  United  States 
commission  began  the  work  of  completing  the  canal  (.1904). 

583.  Election  of  Roosevelt. — There  were  almost  as  many 
parties  as  ever  in  the  campaign  of  1904.      The  Republicans 
indorsed  the  existing  administration,  demanded  the  continu 
ance  of  the  protective  tariff  and  the  gold  standard,  and  nomi 
nated   Koosovelt  for  President  and  Charles  AY.  Fairbanks  for 
Vice  President.     The  Democrats  nominated  Alton  B.  Parker 


488  THE   ECONOMIC    STRUGGLE 

and  Henry  G.  Davis,  and  declared  for  a  reduction  of  the  tariff 
and  against  militarism  and  trusts,  but  were  silent  on  the 
money  question.  Roosevelt  and  Fairbanks  were  elected  by  a 
large  majority. 

SUMMARY 

1.  The  political  issues  before  the  country  since  1880  have  been  of  two 

general  classes,  industrial  and  financial. 

2.  The  industrial  issues  led  to  the  formation  of  certain  great  organiza 

tions,  as  the  Farmers'  Alliance.  Knights  of  Labor,  Patrons  of  In 
dustry,  etc. ;  and  to  the  enactment  of  certain  important  laws,  as  the 
Interstate  Commerce  Act,  the  Anti-Chinese  laws,  the  Anti-Contract 
Labor  law,  and  the  establishment  of  the  Labor  Bureau  and  the 
Bureau  of  Corporations. 

3.  The  financial  issues  were  in  general  connected  in  some  way  with  the 

agitation  for  free  coinage  of  silver. 

4.  These  issues  seriously  affected  both  the  old  parties  and  produced 

others,  as  the  Anti-monopoly  party,  the  People's  party,  the  Silver 
party,  the  National,  the  Socialist  Labor. 

5.  In  1893  financial  questions  became  so  serious  that  a  panic  occurred 

which  forced  the  repeal  of  the  purchase  clause  of  the  Sherman  Act, 
and  made  necessary  the  issue  of  $262,000,000  in  bonds. 
G.  Among  our  foreign  complications  during  this  period  were  the  questions 
of  the  annexation  of  the  Hawaiian  Islands,  the  Venezuela  boundary 
dispute,  the  Cuban  question,  which  finally  involved  us  in  a  war  with 
Spain,  and  the  trouble  with  China  arising  from  the  Boxer  outbreak. 

7.  The  chief  events  of  the  war  with  Spain  were  Dewey's  naval  victory  in 

Manila  Bay,  May  1 ;  the  battles  of  El  Caney  and  San  Juan,  near 
Santiago,  July  1 ;  the  naval  battle  of  July  3  off  Santiago;  the  sur 
render  of  Santiago,  July  14 ;  the  invasion  of  Porto  Rico,  near  the 
end  of  July;  and  the  capture  of  Manila,  August  13. 

8.  The  war  resulted  in  the  cession  of  Porto  Rico  and  the  Philippines  to 

our  country,  and  in  Spain's  withdrawal  from  Cuba. 
0.   The  withdrawal  of  Spain  from  the  Philippines  was  followed  by  an 
uprising  of  natives  led  by  Aguinaldo  ;  but  the  insurrection  was  soon 
suppressed,  and  a  system  of  civil  government  established. 
10.    By  peaceful  negotiation  a  treaty  was  perfected,  giving  the  United 
States  control  of  the  route  for  the  Panama  canal. 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA 

BY  KENDRIC  CHARLES  BABCOCK, 

ASSISTANT   PROFESSOR   OF    AMERICAN    HISTORY,  UNIVERSITY    OF   CALIFORNIA 

1.  Discovery  and  Exploration.  —  The  Spaniards  were  the 
discoverers  and  explorers  of  what  is  now  the  state  of  Cali 
fornia.  Their  search  for  gold  and  other  riches  in  Mexico  had 
been  disappointing,  and  besides  this,  their  leaders  were  ambi 
tious  to  rule  over  more  provinces.  So  ship  after  ship  was  sent 
along  the  western  coast  of  Mexico  about  1530,  in  the  hope  of 
finding  a  country  abounding  with  treasure  (pp.  19-20).  At 
last  the  peninsula  we  call  Lower  California  was  discovered.  It 
was  barren  and  rocky  and  anything  but  promising.  Some 
pearls  were  found,  but  no  gold.  Cortes,  the  conqueror  of 
Mexico,  wanted  men  to  explore  farther  in  that  direction,  and 
for  this  reason,  probably,  he  called  the  new  land  California,  a 
name  which  before  that  had  been  used  only  in  a  Spanish 
romance  to  designate  a  fabulous  island  where  gold  was  the 
only  metal  known.  In  the  course  of  time  other  explorations 
were  made,  and  the  name  was  extended  farther  and  farther 
north.  Sometimes  men  spoke  of  two  Californias,  two  islands, 
then  of  Old  and  New  California,  and  finally  of  Upper  and  Lower 
California. 

Many  expeditions  for  exploring  the  coast  and  interior  to  the 
north  were  planned  by  the  royal  officers  in  Mexico.  On  one  of 
these  expeditions  Coronado  and  his  party  sought  in  vain  for 
rich  cities  in  the  interior  (pp.  20-22).  Another  expedition, 
consisting  of  two  ships,  set  out  under  Juan  Cabrillo  (hoo-ahn' 

California  Supplement  —  McMaster's  School  History  of  the  United  States. 

Copyright,  1903,  by  American  Book  Company. 

1 


CALIFOR1STA 

SCALE  OF  MILES 


HISTORY    OF   C  ALIFORM  A  8 

kah-breel'-yo)  in  1542.  This  bold  leader,  or  the  pilot  who  suc 
ceeded  him  at  his  death,  sailed  up  the  coast  as  far  as  Cape 
Meiidocino,  stopping  at  the  bays  of  San  Diego,  Santa  Barbara, 
and  Monterey,  but  missing  San  Francisco,  the  best  one  of  all. 
But  Cabrillo's  men  also  failed  to  find  signs  of  wealth  and  of 
a  rich  people.  No  settlements  came  from  either  of  these 
expeditions,  and  so  unprofitable  did  they  seem  that  it  was 
thirty-five  years  before  California  and  its  Indians  were  again 
disturbed  by  white  men.  Then  an  Englishman,  Sir  Francis 
Drake,  sailed  along  the  western  coast  of  America,  from  the 
Straits  of  Magellan  to  some  point  off  Oregon,  plundering  Span 
ish  ships  and  towns  (pp.  26-27).  He  wintered  probably  in 
what  is  now  known  as  Drakes  Bay,  being  the  first  English 
man  to  see  California.  With  the  exception  of  a  Spanish 
expedition  in  1603,  no  further  important  explorations  of  this 
beautiful  coast  were  made  for  190  years  after  Drake's  visit, 
and  all  the  plans  of  the  kings  of  Spain  and  the  royal  gov 
ernors  of  Mexico  for  colonizing  California  came  to  naught. 
What  the  government  failed  to  do  was  finally  accomplished 
by  the  Jesuit  and  Franciscan  missionary  organizations  in  the 
Catholic  Church. 

2.  The  Missionaries  and  the  Missions.  —  Wherever  in  America 
the  Spaniards  or  the  French  undertook  colonization,  whether 
in  the  West  Indies,  Mexico,  Canada,  or  California,  there  the 
missionaries  went  to  preach  to  the  natives  and  to  win  them  to 
the  Catholic  faith.  At  first  the  Jesuits  were  very  active  in 
Mexico  and  Lower  California,  but  Spain  expelled  them  from  her 
possessions  in  1767,  before  they  had  founded  any  missions  in 
our  California.  The  Jesuits  were  succeeded  by  the  Francis 
cans,  who  had  many  and  powerful  friends  among  the  Mexi 
can  officials.  The  Franciscans  at  once  undertook  the  founding 
of  a  line  of  missions,  extending  from  Lower  California  to 
Monterey,  and  pushed  the  scheme  with  great  energy  and  devo 
tion.  The  leader  of  this  movement  for  expansion  was  a  very 
remarkable  man,  Father  Jumpero  Serra  (hoo-nee'-pa-ro  sar'-rah). 
He  was  a  rare  spirit,  combining  in  one  man  the  qualities  of  a 


4 


SUPPLEMENT 


patient,  untiring  leader,  a  devoted  preacher,  and  a  loyal  friend 
of  the  Indians.  As  he  went  from  place  to  place  establishing 
new  missions  and  caring  for  those  already  built,  often  enduring 
great  disappointments  and  hardships,  he  became  indeed  the 
hero  of  the  mission  period  of  California  history. 

The  first  of  the  missions  founded,  the  first  settlement  in  the 
state  of  California,  was  at  San  Diego,  where  the  cross  was  set 
up  by  Father  Serra  in  July,  1769,  after  he  had  made  the  long 
journey  overland  from  near  the  city  of  Mexico,  across  the 


The  mission  of  San  Diego 

Gulf  of  California,  and  up  through  Lower  California.  In  the 
same  year  an  exploring  party  of  soldiers  and  missionaries  was 
sent  off  from  San  Diego  to  go  to  Monterey  Bay,  there  to  set 
up  another  mission.  But  for  some  reason  this  company  missed 
the  place  they  sought,  and  by  chance  discovered  San  Fran 
cisco  Bay,  which  they  so  named  after  their  own  St.  Francis. 
Though  hampered  by  lack  of  funds,  lack  of  missionaries,  and 
lack  of  soldiers,  and  always  with  failure  staring  him  in  the 
face,  Father  Serra  worked  steadily  on  for  fifteen  years,  found 
ing  mission  after  mission,  until,  at  the  tnue  of  his  death  in 
1784,  he  could  count  nine  in  the  five  hundred  miles  of  country 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA  5 

between  San  Diego  and  San  Francisco.  All  together  the  Fran 
ciscans  established  twenty-one  missions,  and  the  names  they 
gave  them  are  firmly  fixed  in  California  geography;  such 
names,  for  example,  as  San  Diego,  San  Francisco,  Santa  Bar 
bara,  San  Luis  Obispo,  and  San  Kafael.  A  few  places,  like 
Los  Angeles  and  San  Jose,  were  founded  as  pueblos  or  ordinary 
villages,  and  not  as  missions. 

Each  mission  usually  consisted  of  a  church  or  chapel,  a 
group  of  cells  for  the  missionaries,  houses  for  the  soldiers,  and 
a  long  row  of  shops,  workrooms,  and  huts  for  the  "  children," 
as  the  Fathers  called  their  Indian  converts  and  servants. 
These  buildings,  some  of  them  of  beautiful  architecture,  were 
commonly  built  of  adobe  brick  around  a  central  court  or  garden. 
The  Indians,  who  numbered  many  hundreds  around  several 
of  the  missions,  were  taught  to  work  as  well  as  to  pray,  and 
some  of  them  became  skillful  saddlers,  carpenters;  masons, 
and  weavers.  The  fields,  orchards,  and  vineyards  around  the 
missions  were  all  cultivated  by  the  Indians,  and  by  them  also 
large  herds  of  cattle  were  raised  in  the  surrounding  hills  and 
valleys.  The  height  of  the  prosperity  of  the  missions  was 
reached  about  1822,  when  Mexico,  with  California,  was  sepa 
rated  from  Spain  and  became  independent. 

3.  Downfall  of  the  Missions  ;  Character  of  the  Mexican  Period. — 
The  government  of  independent  Mexico  was  disturbed  by  civil 
wars  and  revolutions  until  it  was  too  weak  to  aid  the  mission 
aries  with  money  or  with  men ;  the  rich  mission  properties 
were  coveted  by  scheming  men ;  the  missionaries,  mostly  Span 
iards,  were  suspected  of  disloyalty  to  the  new  government  of 
Mexico,  and  accordingly  they  suffered  many  losses.  The  cli- 
inax  came  in  1834,  when  the  Mexican  governor  of  California 
put  into  execution  a  law  taking  from  the  missionaries  their 
estates,  and  turning  the  property  over  to  administrators  for  the 
benefit  of  the  Indians,  who  were  thus  freed  from  their  subjec 
tion  to  the  Fathers.  The  work  of  the  missionaries  was  speed 
ily  and  completely  undone.  The  Fathers  left,  the  Indians  ran 
away  and  soon  lapsed  into  barbarism,  the  cattle  were  slaugh- 


6  SUPPLEMENT 

tered,  and  the  fields  grew  wild  and  uncultivated.     None  of  the 
missions  save  Santa  Barbara  still  remains  in  the  hands  of  the 


Santa  Barbara  mission 

Franciscans.     Some  of  them  are  parish  churches,  but  most  are 
heaps  of  picturesque  ruins. 

The  period  of  the  Mexican  governors  saw  little  progress,  but 
instead  many  bitter  disputes  and  some  fighting.  The  small 
colony  of  Russians  near  the  mouth  of  the  Russian  River  and 
the  few  English  and  American  settlers  did  not  much  affect  the 
history  of  the  period.  There  was  need  of  new  blood  to  bring 
strength  and  prosperity.  The  Spaniard  and  the  Mexican  had 
claimed  California  for  more  than  three  hundred  years;  for 
seventy-five  they  had  had  colonies  within  it.  Yet  the  total 
white  population  in  all  that  vast  territory  at  the  end  of  that 
time  was  not  above  five  thousand.  Some  of  the  Californians 
were  of  pure  Castilian  Spanish  blood,  but  the  most  of  them 
were  Mexican  Spanish  with  more  or  less  Indian  blood.  Both 
classes  were  cheerful,  hospitable,  and  proud,  but  the  latter  as 
a  rule  were  lazy,  ignorant,  hot-headed,  and  unprogressive. 
Besides  these  qualities,  they  were  especially  fond  of  fine 
clothes.  They  were  expert  horsemen,  traveling  only  on  horse- 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA  7 

back,  and  thinking  it  a  slight  thing  to  ride  twenty  or  thirty 
miles  to  attend  a  dance. 

They  did  little  or  nothing  in  the  way  of  cultivating  the  fer 
tile  valleys,  planting  orchards  or  vineyards,  or  working  the 
mines.  They  still  plowed  the  ground  with  a  heavy  stick 
roughly  shod  with  iron,  drawn  by  a  pole  fastened  by  a  cross- 
piece  to  the  horns  of  oxen.  The  grain  was  threshed  by  spread 
ing  it  on  the  ground  for  the  oxen  to  tread  out;  after  this  it 
was  tossed  in  the  air  so  that  the  wind  might  blow  away  the 
chaff  and  dirt.  The  wheat  was  pounded  to  flour  by  hand,  or 
ground  between  two  stones,  the  upper  one  turned  by  a  mule. 
The  chief  products  sent  out  of  the  country  were  hides  and  tal 
low.  Just  as  tobacco  was  a  sort  of  money  in  early  Virginia,  so 
hides,  at  the  rate  of  $2  apiece,  served  for  money  in  California. 

But  this  country  of  "sweet  doing-nothing,"  this  far-away 
land  known  only  to  a  few  traders  and  a  few  scheming  poli 
ticians,  was  soon  to  be  changed,  and  changed  with  marvelous 
rapidity.  Instead  of  being  an  unknown  land  for  which  nobody 
cared,  it  became  the  center  of  interest  for  a  whole  continent. 

4.  The  United  States  covets  California.  —  Our  government  had 
coveted  the  possession  of  the  fine  harbors  of  San  Francisco 
and  Monterey  for  a  long  time  before  1846,  when  we  obtained 
Oregon  and  when  the  war  with  Mexico  was  begun  (p.  326). 
These  harbors  were  valuable  in  themselves,  and,  besides,  the 
United  States  feared  that  England  or  France  might  find  a 
pretext  to  seize  them,  and  thus  our  people  would  be  shut  out 
entirely  from  the  Pacific  coast.  So  the  United  States  tried  to 
buy  all  the  Mexican  territory  north  of  a  line  running  east  and 
west  just  below  Monterey.  But  Mexico  would  not  sell,  and 
some  other  way  had  to  be  found.  The  first  attempt  to  possess 
California  was  not  at  all  creditable.  Commodore  Jones,  who  was 
in  command  of  the  naval  forces  of  the  United  States  at  Callao, 
in  Peru,  heard  rumors  in  1842  that  war  practically  existed 
between  the  United  States  and  Mexico,  and  that  the  Mexi 
cans  had  ceded  California  to  Great  Britain.  He  straightway 
sailed  to  Monterey  Bay,  took  possession  of  the  port,  ran  up 


8  SUPPLEMENT 

the  American  flag,  and  proclaimed  the  conquest  of  the  terri 
tory  by  his  government.  He  soon  found  out  his  error,  hauled 
down  the  flag,  and  sailed  away.  The  United  States  made 
apologies  to  Mexico,  but  the  Mexican  government  was  properly 
alarmed  at  this  attack,  and  took  steps  to  prevent  further  immi 
gration  of  Americans  into  the  territory.  The  Mexicans  even 
went  so  far  as  to  consider  the  plan  of  expelling  the  few  hundred 
Americans  who  were  already  residents. 

The  Californians  were  still  further  offended,  and  embittered 
against  the  Americans,  by  the  suspicious  movements  of  Cap 
tain  John  C.  Fremont  (pp.  329-332).  Was  he  the  vanguard 
of  a  host  of  immigrants  who  might  overrun  the  country  and 
drive  out  the  Californians  ?  Was  he  there  to  stir  up  a  revolu 
tion  against  the  Mexican  government  ?  These  were  questions 
the  Californians  could  not  easily  answer,  and  it  is  still  uncer 
tain  what  the  exact  nature  of  Fremont's  purposes  was.  He 
perhaps  desired  to  have  the  Californians  attack  his  party, 
thus  giving  him  a  pretext  for  taking  possession  of  Cali 
fornia.  The  pretext  for  war,  however,  was  found  in*~Texas 
(pp.  326-327),  and  the  first  attack  upon  the  Californians  was 
made  quite  without  the  leadership  or  direction  of  Captain  Fre 
mont,  by  a  party  of  men  which  gained  the  curious  name  of 
the  "  Bear  Flag  Party." 

5.  The  Bear  Flag  Incident.  —  By  1846,  several  hundred  Ameri 
cans  were  settled  on  the  rich  farming  lands  of  the  Sacramento 
valley.  In  the  early  summer  of  that  year  they  heard  the 
startling  rumor  that  Castro,  the  Mexican  commander  of  the 
territory,  was  on  his  way  from  Monterey  with  a  considerable 
armed  force,  to  drive  out  all  the  Americans  in  northern  Cali 
fornia  and  confiscate  their  property.  Accordingly,  many  of 
them  gathered  at  Fremont's  camp  near  the  Marysville  Buttes. 
Some  of  these  Americans  captured  a  large  band  of  horses  be 
longing  to  the  Mexican  government,  and  this  offense  seemed 
to  require  them  to  take  still  further  action.  Accordingly  a 
party  of  the  settlers  determined  to  attack  the  military  post  at 
Sonoma,  capture  the  commandant,  M.  G.  Vallejo  (vahl-ya/-ho), 


HISTORY    OF   CALIFORNIA  9 

and  defy  the  Mexican  government.  Under  the  leadership, 
first  of  a  man  named  Merritt,  and  later  of  William  B.  Ide, 
the  plan  was  carried  out.  Sonoma  was  captured  June  14, 
1846,  Vallejo  and  two  others  were  sent  as  prisoners  to  Slitter's 
Fort  (p.  337),  and  Mexican  authority  in  Sonoma  was  over 
thrown.  The  little  revolution  was  completed  by  a  proclama 
tion  of  independence  issued  by  Ide. 

The  idea  of  independence  required  them  to  have  a  name  and 
a  flag.  They  chose  the  name  "  California  Eepublic,"  and  put 
it,  in  large  letters,  on  a 
flag  which  was  made  of 
a  piece  of  coarse  white 
cotton  cloth  with  a  strip 
of  red  flannel  sewed  along 
the  lower  edge.  Besides 
the  name,  a  single  large 
star  and  a  figure  intended 
to  represent  a  grizzly  bear 
were  painted  on  it  in  red  The  Bear  Flagl 

paint.  Thus  the  "Bear  Flag  Nation,"  composed  of  a  few 
dozens  of  men,  claimed  to  succeed  the  Mexican  authority  in 
California.  A  few  days  later  Captain  Fremont  went  to 
Sonoma  and  secured  control  of  the  new  "nation."  It  was 
not  long-lived,  however,  for  early  in  July  news  of  the  out 
break  of  the  Mexican  War  arrived,  the  Bear  Flag  was  pulled 
down,  and  the  stars  and  stripes  waved  in  its  place.  Ide  and 
his  men  were  once  more  under  American  government. 

6.  Conquest  of  California  by  the  United  States.  — The  United 
States  naval  commanders  in  Pacific  waters  had  been  instructed 
to  seize  the  ports  of  California  just  as  soon  as  possible  after 
war  broke  out.  Acting  under  these  instructions,  Commodore 
SI  oat  sailed  up  the  coast  from  Mexico  and,  on  July  7,  1846, 
raised  the  American  flag,  in  place  of  the  Mexican  flag,  over 
the  old  customhouse  in  Monterey.  This  time  it  was  there 

1  From  a  photograph  of  the  flag,  which  is  now  in  the  Hall  of  the  Society 
of  California  Pioneers,  San  Francisco. 


10 


SUPPLEMENT 


The  old  customhouse  at  Monterey 


to  stay.  Within  a  week  the  same  colors  were  flying  at  San 
Francisco,  Sonoma,  and  Slitter's  Fort,  in  the  Sacramento 

valley.  By  the  end  of 
the  year  following,  after 
an  uprising  of  the  Cali- 
fornians  in  the  southern 
part  of  the  state  had  been 
put  down  by  Fremont  and 
Commodore  Stockton,  the 
whole  of  the  territory 
from  Oregon  to  Lower 
California  was  possessed 
by  the  forces  of  the 
United  States  (p.  329). 

The  conquest  was  a  remarkably  peaceful  affair.  There  was  no 
hard  lighting.  Probably  not  more  than  seventy  men  were 
killed  on  both  sides  in  California  during  the  entire  war.  The 
treaty  of  peace,  in  1848,  confirmed  the  title  of  the  United 
States  to  the  territory  thus  conquered,  and  thenceforth  as 
many  Americans  as  should  choose  might  enter  California,  for 
the  American  flag  kept  guard  over  the  Golden  Gate  and  the 
great  valleys. 

7.  The  Discovery  of  Gold ;  the  Forty-niners  (pp.  337-338).  - 
The  Spaniards  knew  that  gold  existed  in  California,  but  neither 
they  nor  the  Mexicans  had  ever  worked  profitably  such  mines  as 
they  found.  The  two  men  whose  names  will  always  be  associated 
with  the  great  discovery  of  gold  were  John  A.  Sutter  and 
James  W.  Marshall.  Sutter  was  a  Swiss  immigrant,  who  had 
acquired  from  the  Mexican  government  a  large  grant  of  land, 
including  the  site  of  the  city  of  Sacramento.  On  this  he  had 
built  a  fort  and  trading  post  and  carried  on  wheat  growing 
and  cattle  raising.  He  thought  that  large  profits  could  be 
made  by  supplying  lumber  to  the  growing  number  of  settlers 
in  California,  and  he  engaged  Marshall,  a  carpenter  who  had 
wandered  out  to  California  from  New  Jersey,  to  locate  and 
build  a  sawmill.  The  site  of  the  mill  was  on  the  American 


HISTORY  OF   CALIFORNIA  11 

tfiver  at  Coloma,  about  sixty  miles  by  trail  from  Slitter's 
Fort.  One  day  in  January,  1848,  before  the  mill  was  finished, 
Marshall  discovered 
some  shining  particles 
in  a  pile  of  sand  and 
mud  which  the  water 
had  washed  into  the 
lower  part  of  the  mill- 
race.  He  examined 
them  carefully  and  de 
cided  that  they  were 
gold.  He  gathered 

more  of  them  and,  four  days  later,  took  them  to  S utter. 
Together  they  tested  them.  They  were  gold  beyond  a  doubt ! 
The  news  of  the  discovery  spread  rapidly  in  the  next 
months.  What  wonder  that  men  became  wildly  excited  when 
one  man  made  $128  in  one  day,  and  the  average  miner  panned 
out  $20  a  day?  The  chief  thing  was  to  get  to  the  mines  with 
a  pick  and  shovel ;  and  so  great  was  the  demand  for  shovels 
that  the  price  rose  from  $1  to  $10.  By  the  end  of  the  year 
(1848)  the  East,  too,  caught  the  gold  fever,  and  preparations 
were  made  for  an  enormous  migration  by  land  and  by  sea. 
During  the  summer  and  fall  of  1849  about  eighty  thousand 
"Forty-niners"  arrived  in  California.  Some  of  them  came 
by  overland  route,  which  required  five  months  of  hot,  dusty, 
dangerous  travel  across  the  plains  and  mountains;  others, 
the  "  Argonauts,"  made  the  equally  long  and  tedious  journey 
around  Cape  Horn;  while  still  others  took  the  short  and 
dangerous  passage  by  way  of  the  fever-stricken  Isthmus  of 
Panama.  The  gold  fields  worked  by  these  incoming  hosts 
widened  very  rapidly,  and  soon  they  stretched  scores  of 
miles  along  the  foothills  of  the  Sierras,  for  the  miners  were 
restless,  eager  men,  often  seeking  and  often  finding  richer 
diggings.  The  increase  in  the  number  of  miners  caused  the 
rise  of  several  prosperous  towns  whose  chief  business  was 
furnishing  supplies  to  the  mines.  Marysville,  Stockton,  and 
McM.  HIST.— 28. 


12  SUPPLEMENT 

Sacramento,  which  became  the  permanent  capital  of  the  state 
in  1854,  were  the  most  noteworthy  among  these  towns. 

When  that  famous  year  (1849)  ended,  California  had  a  popu 
lation  of  upwards  of  one  hundred  thousand,  mostly  men,  who 
had  come  from  other  parts  of  the  United  States.  They  were 
strong,  adventurous,  determined,  independent  men,  intolerant 
of  delays  and  dishonesty.  As  a  class  they  were  superior  in  char 
acter  to  the  men  who  came  during  the  next  two  or  three  years, 
when  the  proportion  of  gamblers,  thieves,  and  ruffians  rapidly 
increased.  With  so  many  men  gathered  together  so  hastily, 
representing  so  many  different  races  and  elements  of  society, 
there  was  the  greatest  need  for  a  strong,  settled  government. 
But  this  proved  to  be  a  hard  thing  to  get. 

8.  The  First  Constitution ;  Admission  into  the  Union  (pp. 
334,  338-341).  — When  the  treaty  of  1848  made  California  a 
part  of  the  United  States,  Congress  should  at  once  have  pro 
vided  some  form  of  territorial  government,  but  it  did  nothing 
of  the  sort.  It  left  the  people  of  the  far-away  region  to  their 
own  devices,  with  no  constitution,  no  revenue,  no  legislature, 
and  no  judges  save  the  alcaldes,  or  justices  of  the  old  Mexican 
law.  The  people  of  the  would-be  state  therefore  decided  to 
act  for  themselves.  A  public  meeting  was  held  in  San  Jose  in 
December,  1848,  which  recommended  calling  a  constitutional 
convention  for  the  next  month.  General  Riley,  the  new  gov 
ernor  appointed  by  President  Polk,  waited  until  he  learned 
that  Congress  had  adjourned  without  taking  action  for  the 
relief  of  California,  and  then  he  yielded  to  the  wishes  of  the 
people  and  called  a  convention. 

The  convention  met  in  Monterey  in  September,  1849,  and 
completed  its  work  in  five  weeks.  It  was  a  distinctly  repre 
sentative  body,  made  up  of  forty-eight  members  who  had  been 
elected  by  the  people  of  California.  It  decided  to  make  a.  con 
stitution  for  a  state  and  not  a  plan  for  a  territorial  organization. 
The  constitution  thus  framed  fixed  the  present  boundaries  of 
the  state,  provided  for  a  governor,  legislature,  judges,  and 
other  officers,  and  prohibited  slavery  forever.  In  November 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA  13 

the  people  adopted  this  constitution  by  an  almost  unanimous 
vote,  and  at  the  same  time  elected  Peter  II.  Burnett  as  the 
first  governor  under  the  constitution.  A  lieutenant  governor, 
legislature,  and  two  representatives  in.  Congress  were  also 
elected.  When  the  legislature  met  in  the  winter,  it  elected 
John  C.  Fremont  and  William  M.  Gwin  the  first  United  States 
senators.  These  two  men,  with  the  two  representatives, 
hastened  to  Washington  with  an  official  copy  of  the  new 
constitution,  and  asked  for  the  admission  of  the  Pacific  com- 
monwealth  into  the  Union  (pp.  338-341).  More  than  six 
months  passed,  however,  before  action  was  taken.  At  last, 
after  a  summer  spent  in  wrangling  over  slavery  questions, 
Congress  passed  the  bill  admitting  California,  and  President 
Fillmore  signed  it  on  September  9,  1850,  the  Admission  Day 
of  the  Golden  State. 

9.  The  Struggle  for  Order ;  the  Vigilance  Committees.  —  Even 
with  a  constitution  and  a  state  government  it  was  by  no  means 
an  easy  matter  to  make  and  enforce  laws  for  the  new  and  tur 
bulent  mining  communities.  The  population  grew  at  an  un 
heard-of  rate.  All  sorts  of  men  came  in,  and  among  them  were 
many  lawless  adventurers  and  criminals  from  the  East,  from 
Europe,  and  from  the  British  convict  colonies  in  Australia. 
What  wonder  that  the  steady,  hard-working  miners  hated  the 
foreigner  and  lost  no  chance  to  drive  him  out  of  camp ! 
Under  the  unusual  conditions  of  the  time,  the  mining  camps 
often  took  matters  into  their  own  hands  and  administered  jus 
tice  in  their  own  way  without  waiting  for  the  slow  and  uncer 
tain  processes  of  the  law  and  courts  of  the  state.  Lynch  law 
served  their  purposes  well,  and  by  the  rough  rules  of  their 
common  sense  or  their  anger,  the  miners  in  mass  meeting  gave 
the  offender  the  briefest  possible  trial,  and  if  found  guilty  he 
was  whipped,  banished,  or  hanged  without  delay.  As  the 
mining  camps  grew  into  towns,  and  conditions  became  more 
settled,  these  proceedings  became  more  and  more  infrequent, 
but  for  fifty  years  there  were  occasional  instances  of  lynch- 
ings. 


14  SUPPLEMENT 

Conditions  were  bad  enough  in  the  small  mining  camps, 
where  each  man  knew  all  the  rest.  But  they  were  far  worse 
in  the  growing  cities  like  San  Francisco  and  some  of  the  inte 
rior  towns,  which  were  not  above  following  the  example  of  the 
mining  camps,  though  with  rather  more  deliberation  in  pro 
cedure.  The  evil  doings  of  the  ruffians  in  San  Francisco  be 
came  intolerable  in  1851.  Drinking  and  gambling  might  go 
on  unchecked,  but  when  robberies  and  murders  grew  terribly, 
frequent,  and  five  great  fires  swept  the  city  within  a  year  and  a 
half,  something  unusual  had  to  be  done.  The  first  Committee 
of  Vigilance  was  formed,  and  for  more  than  two  months  this 
body  of  unofficial  citizens  assumed  the  right  to  try  notorious 
offenders.  It  even  went  so  far  as  to  hang  four  of  the  worst 
ruffians,  and  succeeded  for  a  time  in  driving  out  and  keeping 
out  the  most  objectionable  persons.  But  in  four  or  five  years 
San  Francisco  was  worse  off  than  before.  It  was  a  city  of  fifty 
thousand  people,  but  most  of  its  citizens  were  too  busy  making 
money  to  give  much  time  or  attention  to  the  government  or 
the  morals  of  their  city.  Consequently  the  city  government 
became  fearfully  corrupt;  public  money  in  large  sums  was 
stolen ;  juries  were  bribed,  and  the  guilty  allowed  to  escape 
punishment ;  and  to  crown  all,  the  ballot  boxes  at  elections 
were  systematically  stuffed,  so  that  criminals  were  elected  to 
office.  James  King,  the  editor  of  the  Bulletin,  scathingly 
denounced  both  conditions  and  men,  and  for  this  reason  was 
murdered  by  James  Casey.  This  murder  brought  matters  to 
a  crisis.  The  great  Vigilance  Committee,  with  a  membership 
of  thirty-five  hundred,  was  organized  by  prominent  citizens  in 
May,  1856.  For  more  than  three  months  it  practically  ruled 
San  Francisco,  even  maintaining  a  well-armed  and  organized 
militia.  The  Vigilance  Committee  was  rather  feebly  opposed 
by  the  Law  and  Order  Party,  but,  on  the  whole,  it  had  the 
backing  of  the  great  mass  of  citizens,  who  saw  no  better  or 
more  legal  way  of  getting  relief  from  unbearable  corruption 
and  danger.  The  results  of  the  work  of  the  committee  were 
the  public  hanging  of  Casey  and  three  other  murderers,  the 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA  15 

banishment  of  a  score  of  "toughs,"  the  frightening  away  of 
many  more,  the  trial  of  several  other  men,  including  a  justice 
of  the  state  supreme  court,  and  finally  the  nomination  and 
election  of  upright  men  for  city  officers.  Probably  the  Novem 
ber  election  in  1856  was  the  first  honest  election  the  city  had 
ever  had.  By  these  most  revolutionary  means  San  Francisco 
was  cleared  of  its  worst  elements,  and  for  several  years  it  was 
a  safe,  honestly  governed  city,  and  an  example  for  the  state. 
The  struggle  for  order  in  the  cities  and  the  state  at  large  was 
long,  but  finally  successful. 

10.  Land  Titles  and  Squatter  Disturbances.  —  One  of  the  most 
vexatious  questions  affecting  a  great  many  of  the  early  settlers 
in  California  was  the  question  of  land  titles.  No  man  wants 
to  put  up  buildings  or  plant  orchards  unless  he  is  sure  his  title 
to  the  land  is  good.  The  Spaniard  and  the  Mexican  put  little 
value  upon  the  land  save  as  a  place  for  grazing  cattle,  and  as 
land  was  most  abundant,  their  governors  made  grants  of  large 
areas  to  men  and  to  pueblos  or  villages  in  the  most  careless 
fashion.  The  boundaries  were  often  vague  and  conflicting,  and 
regular  records  of  the  grants  were  lacking.  So  in  the  regions 
settled  by  the  Spanish  it  was  particularly  hard  to  find  out  who 
had  legal  title  to  some  large  and  important  tracts,  as,  for 
example,  the  land  where  Sacramento  and  San  Francisco  now  are. 
When  the  American  came,  he  had  a  great  contempt  for  the 
Calif ornians  and  their  rights.  He  looked  upon  vacant  land  as 
public  land,  to  be  occupied  or  "  squatted  on  "  by  the  first  to 
desire  it,  until  a  title  could  be  had  from  the  United  States 
government,  which  owned  all  public  land.  Therefore  when 
the  tide  of  immigration  was  running  high,  numerous  squatters 
appeared.  Each  laid  claim  to  a  lot,  or  a  tract  of  ranch  land, 
and  set  up  his  cabin.  If  he  was  within  some  previous  grant, 
he  prepared  to  defend  his  "right"  against  all  other  claimants 
by  whatever  title.  Bloodshed  and  even  death  resulted  from 
encounters  between  these  squatters  and  the  claimants  by  some 
old  grant.  In  Sacramento  in  1850,  where  the  squatters  deter 
mined  to  disregard  rights  derived  from  Slitter's  Mexican  title, 


16  SUPPLEMENT 

a  serious  riot  occurred  in  which  the  sheriff  of  the  county  and 
several  other  men  were  killed. 

In  the  mines  similar  troubles  arose.  The  United  States  had 
no  mining-land  laws  to  regulate  the  possession  of  claims  in  the 
gold  regions.  The  land  had  not  been  surveyed,  and  no  one 
could  obtain  a  clear  title.  So  a  rude  code  was  formed,  by  the 
miners  themselves  to  regulate  the  size  and  title  of  claims  and  to 
prevent  "jumping  claims,"  by  which  one  miner  tried  to  take 
possession  of  another's  claim.  The  rule  was  that  the  temporary 
owner  must  work  his  claim  or  somebody  else  might  take  and 
work  it. 

The  United  States  created  a  Land  Commission,  in  1851,  to 
look  into  the  land  titles  derived  from  old  grants,  and  to 
settle  them  with  the  aid  of  the  courts  of  the  United  States. 
Several  hundred  cases  were  dealt  with,  but  so  vague  and 
irregular  were  many  of  the  titles,  and  so  difficult  were  they  to 
prove,  that  many  long  and  expensive  lawsuits  vexed  the  courts, 
and  an  amazing  lot  of  frauds  and  forgeries  was  disclosed.  One 
of  the  most  remarkable  was  the  fraudulent  claim  of  one  man  to 
a  considerable  part  of  San  Francisco,  and  to  some  six  hundred 
thousand  acres  besides. 

11.  The  Civil  War.  — The  great  Civil  War  disturbed  Cali 
fornia  less  than  most  of  the  other  states,  for  it  was  very  far 
away  from  the  centers  of  action.  Many  of  the  early  settlers 
were  from  the  slave-holding  states,  and  some  of  them,  like 
Senator  Gwin,  filled  prominent  places.  Yet  the  constitution 
under  which  the  state  was  admitted  into  the  Union  prohibited 
slavery  forever,  and  in  the  ten  years  after  admission  the  pro 
portion  of  Northern  men  steadily  grew,  since  the  men  from  the 
South  could  not  bring  their  slave  property  with  them.  The 
Democratic  party  in  the  state  was  divided,  as  it  was  elsewhere, 
upon  the  slavery  issue  (pp.  352-353,  357-358).  David  C.  Brod- 
erick,the  skillful  Democratic  politician,  made  his  long  and  finally 
successful  fight  against  Gwin  for  the  United  States  senator- 
ship  as  an  antislavery  leader.  When  the  Avar  broke  out,  the 
general  sentiment  was  strong  for  the  Union.  The  resolutions 


HISTORY  OF  CALIFORNIA  17 

passed  by  the  legislature,  and  the  sympathy  of  Governors 
Leland  Stanford  and  Frederick  Low,  were  unwaveringly  for 
the  North.  On  account  of  the  distance  and  lack  of  railroads, 
the  state  sent  few  troops  into  the  Eastern  armies.  In  place  of 
men,  and  in  addition  to  her  quota  of  the  heavy  war  taxes 
(pp.  419-421),  she  sent  much-needed  gold,  and  contributed  with 
marvelous  generosity  to  aid  the  soldiers.  Just  as  the  people 
of  the  state  gave  their  tens  of  thousands  of  dollars  to  the  Red 
Cross  work  during  the  war  with  Spain  in  1898,  so  they  gave 
to  the  famous  Sanitary  Commission,  for  the  soldiers,  all  through 
the  long  and  terrible  years  of  the  Civil  War,  until  their  contri 
butions  reached  the  magnificent  total  of  a  million  and  a  quarter 
of  dollars. 

12.  Communication  with  the  East ;  the  Pacific  Railroads.  — 
While  the  war  was  in  progress,  work  was  pushed  in  California 
upon  the  great  railroad  which  was  to  unite  the  Pacific  coast 
with  the  East.  There  had  been  much  discussion  of  this  proj 
ect  ever  since  the  discovery  of  gold,  for  the  three  ways  of 
getting  from  the  East  to  California  were  all  difficult  (p.  11  of 
this  supplement).  The  first  California  legislature  called  upon 
the  national  government  to  construct  the  road,  since  no 
company  of  that  time  would  undertake  such  an  enormous 
piece  of  work.  But  it  was  twelve  years  before  the  United 
States  came  to  help  the  project,  and  nearly  twenty  years 
before  the  road  was  completed.  In  the  meantime  the  improve 
ment  of  communications  with  the  East  was  steady  but  slow. 
Regular  steamers  left  twice  a  week  for  Panama,  and  in  three 
weeks  passengers  and  mail  might  reach  New  York  from  San 
Francisco.  In  about  the  same  time  a  man,  after  1858,  might 
go  by  regular  stagecoach  from  San  Francisco  to  St.  Louis  by 
way  of  Arizona,  Texas,  and  Arkansas.  In  1860,  the  famous 
"  pony  express "  began  to  carry  mail  from  St.  Joseph  in 
Missouri  to  Sacramento  in  about  ten  days  (p.  434).  A  tele 
graph  line  to  San  Francisco  was  put  in  operation  in  1861. 
Thus  news  might  travel  fast,  but  passengers  and  freight  had 
to  go  in  the  old  slow  fashion.  Congress  at  last  passed  a  series 


18  SUPPLEMENT 

of  acts  giving  remarkably  liberal  grants  of  land  and  United 
States  bonds  to  help  two  companies  to  build  the  railroad 
through  Nebraska,  Utah,  and  Nevada  to  the  Pacific  (p.  435). 
With  this  great  aid,  and  with  the  generous  subsidies  given  by 
the  cities,  counties,  and  state  of  California,  the  first  transconti 
nental  railroad  was  completed  by  way  of  Omaha  and  the  Great 
Salt  Lake  to  San  Francisco. l  The  longed-for  day  came  when 
on  May  10, 1869,  the  two  trains,  one  from  the  East  and  one  from 
the  West,  met  at  Promontory  in  Utah.  Passengers  and  freight, 
as  well  as  mail,  might  now  make  the  journey  from  New  York 
harbor  to  the  Golden  Gate  in  ten  days.  A  few  years  later 
another  transcontinental  line  was  completed  by  way  of  Los 
Angeles,  El  Paso,  and  New  Orleans,  and  by  the  end  of  the 
century  four  such  lines  had  entrance  into  California. 

The  benefits  to  the  state  from  the  completion  of  the  Pacific 
railroad  have  been  great  and  permanent.  Traveling  has  grown 
steadily  easier,  quicker,  and  cheaper.  New  sections  of  the  state 
have  been  developed.  Products  of  all  kinds  can  be  more  readily 
marketed.  Yet  the  company  building  and  operating  the  rail 
road  lias  been  subject  to  continual  criticism  and  denunciation 
ever  since  the  road  was  opened.  Several  reasons  for  this  are 
to  be  found.  The  people  believed  that  the  remarkable  grants 
from  the  United  States  and  the  state  had  been  unnecessarily 
large,  making  the  owners  too  rich.  The  absorbing  of  nearly 
all  the  smaller  lines  of  the  state  into  one  corporation,  under  the 
later  name  of  the  Southern  Pacific  Company,  created  a  practical 
monopoly,  and  men  properly  hate  a  monopoly.  Rates,  charges, 
and  demands  were  often  unfair  and  extortionate.  The  company 
refused  to  pay  large  amounts  of  taxes  levied  upon  its  property. 
Whether  all  these  complaints  were  warranted  or  not,  the  politics 
of  the  state  for  thirty  years  after  the  last  spike  was  driven  were 

1  Five  men  were  the  chief  promoters  and  owners  of  the  road :  Theodore 
•Tudah,  the  skillful  engineer;  Leland  Stanford  and  Collis  P.  Huntington, 
the  financiers  in  the  West  and  the  East;  Charles  F.  Crocker,  the  builder  of  the 
road ;  and  Mark  Hopkins,  who  looked  after  the  purchase  of  supplies.  Thtj 
last  four  made  large  fortunes  from  the  enterprise. 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA  19 

greatly  and  unfortunately  affected  by  questions  relating  to  the 
management  of  the  road  and  the  taxation  of  its  property. 

13.  The  Chinese;  the  Workingmen's  Party.  —  The  Chinese 
began  to  come  to  California  in  considerable  numbers  about 
1850,  and  at  first  they  were  welcomed  and  encouraged.  But 
soon  an  anti-Chinese  sentiment  appeared,  which  grew  steadily 
with  the  growth  of  the  Chinese  population,  especially  in  the 
mines.  In  spite  of  the  heavy  taxes  laid  upon  them,  in  spite 
of  persecution,  hatred,  and  murders,  Chinamen  kept  coming 
until  there  were  a  hundred  thousand  of  them  in  the  state. 
Then  further  immigration  of  them  was  stopped  by  an  act  of 
Congn->.s  in. 

The  Chinamen  as  a  rule  are  industrious,  peaceable,  reliable, 
and  apt  to  learn,  and  these  qualities  have  made  them  excellent 
laborers,  as  was  shown  in  the  building  of  the  Pacific  railroads, 
when  thousands  of  them  were  employed  in  preference  to  white 
men.  But  they  have  been  willing  to  work  for  lower  wages 
than  the  white  laborer;  they  have  spent  little  money,  living 
very  cheaply ;  they  have  not  been  home  makers,  except  in  rare 
instances ;  they  have  lived  huddled  together  in  close,  unclean 
quarters.  Because  of  these  things  the  anti-Chinese  feeling  has 
usually  been  strong  and  now  and  then  dangerous.  The  climax 
of  the  agitation  was  reached  in  1877,  when  the  anti-Chinese 
rioters  terrorized  San  Francisco,  destroyed  several  Chinese 
laundries,  burned  the  Pacific  Mail  wharf,  where  most  of  the 
Chinese  immigrants  were  landed,  and  threatened  to  burn  out 
the  Chinese  of  the  city. 

This  violent  outburst  against  the  Chinese  was  only  one  part 
of  a  large  movement  of  the  discontented  and  unemployed  of 
San  Francisco  and  the  state.  Great  numbers  of  men  were  out 
of  work,  and  they  were  very  bitter  against  what  they  thought 
to  be  the  three  causes  of  their  distress,  —  the  Chinamen,  the 
capitalists,  and  the  railroad.  They  held  meetings  on  certain 
vacant  lots  near  the  San  Francisco  city  hall,  known  as  the 
sand  lots,  and  there  listened  to  the  "  sand-lot  orators  "  whose 
chief  cry  was,  "  The  Chinese  must  go !  "  This  agitation  seemed 


20 


SUPPLEMENT 


so  dangerous  that  a  partial  revival  of  the  Vigilance  Committee 
organization  took  place  in  order  to  protect  the  city  from  a  pos 
sible  riot.  The  volunteer  force  in  this  case,  however,  was 
armed  not  with  guns,  but  with  hickory  pick  handles,  and 
hence  it  was  known  as  the  "  pick -handle  brigade."  But  there 
was  no  outbreak.  The  movement  took  a  political  turn  and 
spread  over  the  state.  As  a  result,  the  Workingmen's  Party 
was  organized,  and  for  several  years  exercised  a  considerable 


Capitol  of  California 

influence,  particularly  upon  the  making  of  the  second  consti 
tution  of  the  state. 

14.  The  Constitution  of  1879.  —  A  sentiment  had  developed 
in  the  state  that  the  constitution  of  1849  had  been  outgrown, 
so  the  people  voted  in  September,  1877,  for  calling  .a  conven 
tion  to  change  the  constitution.  When  the  legislature  had 
set  the  exact  time,  members  of  the  convention  were  elected, 
among  them  being  many  chosen  by  the  Workingmen's  Party. 
They  met  in  Sacramento  in  the  fall  of  1878,  and  worked  for 
five  months.  The  constitution  thus  framed  was  adopted  by 


HISTORY  OF  CALIFORNIA  21 

the  people,  and  went  into  full  effect  on  January  1,  1880.  It 
cannot  be  said  that  the  new  constitution,  made  at  a  time  when 
there  was  so  much  unrest  among  the  people,  was  a  great  im 
provement  on  the  old  one.  It  was  loaded  down  with  vague 
and  extreme  provisions  relating  to  taxation,  the  Chinese, 
and  the  railroads.  In  fact,  at  almost  every  election  since 
its  adoption,  amendments  have  been  added  to  modify  or 
explain  it. 

15.  California  Schools.  —  Education  took  a  new  start  when 
the  state  was  admitted  into  the  Union.  Before  that  time, 
when  the  Spaniard  ruled,  the  missionaries  were  the  teachers, 
but  the  instruction  for  the  white  and  Indian  children  was 
of  the  simplest  sort  save  in  matters  of  religion.  After  the 
missions  lost  their  estates  and  the  missionaries  were  driven 
out,  the  California  boys  and  girls  were  little  bothered  with 
books  or  study  for  many  years,  since  there  were  no  teachers, 
few  books,  and  little  apparent  need  for  arithmetic  or  composi 
tion.  The  coming  of  Americans  with  families  soon  changed 
all  this.  The  basis  of  the  new  system  was  firmly  laid  by  the 
United  States,  which  granted  to  the  state,  upon  its  admission, 
a  great  quantity  of  land  to  be  devoted  to  the  support  of  the 
public  schools.  From  the  sale  of  this  land  has  come  the  pres 
ent  school  fund,  which  amounted,  in  1900,  to  nearly  $4,000,000. 
The  income  from  this  fund,  together  with  the  poll  taxes  and 
other  taxes  levied  by  the  state  for  school  purposes,  is  every 
year  so  divided  that  nearly  every  grammar  school  and  primary 
school  in  the  state  gets  a  share.  This  goes  with  local  taxes 
to  maintain  a  school  for  at  least  six  months  in  the  year. 
With  this  income  from  the  state,  increased  by  liberal  taxes 
levied  by  the  people  in  every  city,  town,  and  county  in  the 
state,  our  common  school  system  has  become  one  of  the  best  in 
the  country.  Along  with  the  common  schools,  a  large  number 
of  excellent  high  schools  have  been  organized  and  generously 
equipped,  and  by  a  law  passed  in  1903,  these  high  schools  will 
also  receive  support  from  a  state  tax.  In  addition  to  these,  the 
state  maintains  five  normal  schools  for  training  teachers,  these 


22  SUPPLEMENT 

being  located  at  San  Jose  (the  oldest  one),  Los  Angeles,  Chico, 
San  Diego,  and  San  Francisco. 

16.  The  University  of  California ;  Leland  Stanford  Junior  Uni 
versity. —  The  crown  of  the  public  school  system  of  the  state 
is  the  University  of  California.  It  was  created  by  an  act  of  the 
legislature  in  1868,  and  with  it  was  merged  the  College  of  Cali 
fornia,  which  had  been  established  for  some  years.  It  was  at 
first  located  in  Oakland,  but  in  1873  it  was  moved  to  the  present 
commanding  and  beautiful  site  in  Berkeley.  From  the  small 
institution  of  that  day  the  University  of  California  grew  in 
size  and  influence,  until  in  1903  it  enrolled  in  its  various  de 
partments  more  than  three  thousand  two  hundred  students. 
Except  in  some  of  the  professional  colleges,  like  the  College  of 
Medicine,  all  these  students  are  given  free  instruction.  Such 
generosity  on  the  part  of  the  university  of  the  state  has  been 
made  possible  by  the  combined  liberality  of  the  nation,  the 
state,  and  individual  citizens.  A  large  part  of  the  income  of 
the  university  comes  from  the  land  grant  made  by  the  United 
States  to  California  and  the  other  states  in  1862,  in  aid  of 
instruction  in  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts.  Since  then 
Congress  has  made  several  annual  grants  of  money.  Large 
appropriations  by  the  legislature,  a  tax  of  two  cents  on  every 
$100  of  property  in  the  state,  and  the  great  gifts  of  James 
Lick,  D.  0.  Mills,  Mrs.  Phoebe  A.  Hearst,  and  others,  have 
added  greatly  to  the  strength  and  beauty  of  the  university. 

The  other  great  university  of  the  state  was  founded  by  the 
former  governor  and  United  States  senator,  Leland  Stanford, 
and  his  wife,  Jane  L.  Stanford,  in  memory  of  their  only  child, 
after  whom  they  named  the  institution  Leland  Stanford  Junior 
University.  To  it  they  gave  their  vast  fortune  of  many  mil 
lions  as  an  endowment,  thus  carrying  out  their  wish  to  "  make 
the  children  of  the  state  their  children."  The  university  is 
located  at  Palo  Alto.  It  opened  its  doors  to  students  in  1891. 
Within  twelve  years  its  endowment  had  much  increased  in 
value,  making  it  one  of  the  richest  universities  in  the  world, 
a  noble  group  of  buildings  had  arisen,  and  the  number  of 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA 


23 


students  had  passed  fourteen  hundred.  Tuition  at  this  uni 
versity  is  also  free. 

Besides  these  free  schools  and  universities,  there  are  in  the 
state  several  private  schools  for  boys  and  for  girls,  and  about 
fifteen  colleges  and  church  seminaries. 

17.  Changes  in  California  Life. —  Up  to  the  discovery  of  gold, 
California  was  the  country  of  the  easy-going,  unenterprising 
cattle  rancher.  Then  it  became  an  El  Dorado,  a  Golden  State, 
and  its  canons,  mountains,  and  streams  were  explored  and 
forced  to  yield  their  millions  in  nuggets  and  dust.  But  all  the 


A  California  vineyard 

while  the  best  source  of  wealth  was  waiting  to  be  discovered. 
It  was  the  soil,  after  all,  rather  than  the  mines,  which  was 
to  be  the  basis  of  the  greatest  and  most  lasting  prosperity  of 
the  state.  The  rich  black  soil,  which  would  yield  its  treasure 
year  after  year,  was  better  than  the  glittering  sand  which 
yielded  only  one  crop.  The  new  settlers  soon  found  that  the 
soil  was  fertile,  and  after  experiment  made  the  great  valleys 
give  them  bountiful  crops  of  wheat  and  barley,  such  indeed 
as  the  men  from  New  York  and  Iowa  hardly  dreamed  of. 
Twenty-five  years  after  the  admission  of  the  state,  the  annual 
crop  of  grain  was  worth  more  than  the  annual  product  of  the 


24  SUPPLEMENT 

gold  mines.  While  the  crops  of  grain  were  thus  increasing,  it 
was  gradually  proved  that  there  was  scarcely  any  fruit  which 
could  not  be  grown  profitably  somewhere  in  this  great  state. 
The  missionaries  had  grown  the  "  mission  grape,"  from  which 
they  had  produced  wine,  and  thus  the  grape  was  the  first  fruit 
for  which  the  state  became  famous.  But  this  was  only  a  begin 
ning.  By  1900,  when  extensive  irrigation  systems  had  been 
developed,  and  when  the  railroads  and  steamship  lines  fur 
nished  wide  markets,  California  was  the  greatest  fruit-grow 
ing  state  in  the  Union,  shipping  enormous  quantities  of  oranges, 
lemons,  prunes,  pears,  peaches,  raisins,  and  olives.  It  had  be 
come  trebly  the  Golden  State,  with  the  fine  gold  of  its  mines, 
the  golden  grain  of  its  valleys,  and  the  golden  fruit  of  its 
orchards. 

18.  Recent  Mineral  Developments;  Manufacturing;  Commerce 
(1903).  —  Though  California  has  always  been  a  great  gold- 
producing  state,  its  production  had  fallen  in  1890  to  less  than 
one  sixth  what  it  was  in  the  wonderful  years  just  after 
Marshall's  discovery.  The  enormously  rich  diggings  were 
long  ago  worked  down  or  abandoned  altogether,  and  Coloma, 
where  the  first  "strike"  was  made,  is  now  in  the  midst  of 
an  orchard  region.  Since  1890,  with  new  and  more  scientific 
methods,  the  value  of  the  gold  produced  has  slowly  risen. 
Costly  mills  for  crushing  the  ore  dug  up  from  deep  mines, 
and  enormous  dredges  upon  the  rivers,  have  taken  the  place 
of  the  simple  "  rocker "  and  "  cradle  "  with  which  the  lucky 
Forty-niner  made  his  thousands.  But  other  minerals  have 
appeared  to  share  the  place  which  gold  once  occupied  alone. 
The  quicksilver  mines  near  New  Almaden  and  St.  Helena,  the 
vast  copper  mines  in  Shasta  County,  and  the  exceedingly  pro 
ductive  oil  wells  in  the  neighborhood  of  Los  Angeles,  Bakers- 
field,  and  Santa  Paula,  are  already  very  large  elements  in  the 
prosperity  of  the  state.  The  electrical  engineers  demand  more 
and  more  copper;  the  railroads  and  manufacturers  need  cheaper 
fuel  than  they  have  had  in  imported  coal.  Both  these  needs 
may  be  supplied  largely  from  within  our  own  state. 


HISTORY   OF   CALIFORNIA 


25 


California  has  never  figured  as  one  of  the  great  manufactur 
ing  states,  but  in  the  last  ten  years  of  the  nineteenth  century 
she  made  rapid  strides  toward  the  front.  In  refining  sugar, 
in  making  wines  and  brandies,  in  drying  and  canning  fruit, 
in  sawing  lumber,  and  in  producing  electricity  by  means  of 
the  water  power  of  the  mountains,  she  has  added  a  new  chap 
ter  to  her  history  of  progress.  At  the  same  time  her  extensive 
shipyards  have  been  turning  out  fine  steamers  and  such  mag 
nificent  battle  ships  as  the  Oregon  and  the  Wisconsin  to  add  to 
her  fame  in  iron  manufacturing. 


A 


The  "Oregon  " 

The  ocean  commerce  of  the  state  and  of  the  whole  Pacific 
coast  has  centered  largely  in  San  Francisco.  The  Bay  of  San 
Francisco  is  one  of  the  finest  in  the  world,  and  from  the  days 
when  the  motley  fleets  of  the  Argonauts  steered  their  way 
toward  the  Golden  Gate,  to  the  departure  of  the  stately  trans 
ports  for  Manila  or  the  great  mail  steamers  for  Japan  and 
China,  the  commerce  of  California  has  marvelously  grown. 
Scores  of  steamers,  large  and  small,  ply  up  and  down  the 


26 


SUPPLEMENT 


coast,  to  Alaska  and  Puget  Sound,  and  to  Mexico  and  South 
America.  By  wind  and  by  steam  great  ships  come  from 
Europe,  New  York,  China,  and  Japan,  bringing  cargoes  of 
merchandise,  teas,  coffees,  sugars,  wool,  and  machinery.  In 
going  out  they  carry  not  merely  what  this  state  produces,  but 
what  every  part  of  the  United  States  contributes  to  the  com 
merce  of  this  central  port  of  the  coast.  Thus  California,  in 
a  little  more  than  fifty  years  as  a  part  of  the  United  States, 
has  changed  from  a  sparsely  settled  cattle-raising  territory 
to  a  progressive  mining,  agricultural,  and  manufacturing  state ; 
from  a  place  of  obscure  trading  posts  to  the  proud  position  of 
mistress  of  the  American  commerce  on  the  Pacific  Ocean. 


The  Golden  Gate 


INDEX  TO  CALIFORNIA  SUPPLEMENT 


Admission  Day,  13. 
Agriculture,  5,  7,  15,  23,  24. 
"Argonauts,"  11,  25. 

Baker  sfidd.  24. 

Bear  Flag,  making  of,  9  ;  supplanted  by  the 

Stars  and  Stripes,  9. 
Bear  Flag  incident,  8,  9. 
Berkeley,  22. 
Broderick,  D.  C.,  16. 
Burnett,  P.  H.,  13. 

Cabrillo,  1,  3. 

California,  discovered,  1 ;  explored,  l^t ; 
named,  1 ;  Upper  and  Lower,  1  ;  life  in 
Mexican  period,  0,  7  ;  taken  by  Commodore 
Jones,  7,  S  ;  conquest  by  the  United  States, 
9, 10  ;  gold  discovered,  10-12  ;  rapid  growth, 

11,  12  ;  first  constitution,  12,  13;  admission, 

12,  13;  struggles  for  order,  13-15,  19,  20; 
slavery  question,  13,  16;  Civil  War,  16,  17: 
communication  with  East,  17,  18:  Pacific 
railroads,  17,  18;  constitution  of   1879,   20, 
21  ;  manufacturing  and  commerce,  24-26. 

"California  Republic, "9. 

Cape  Mendocino,  3. 

Casey,  James,  14. 

Castro,  8. 

Chico,  22. 

Chinese,  character  in  California,  19 ;  anti- 
Chinese  agitation,  19-21. 

Civil  War,  California's  part  in,  16,  17. 

College  of  California,  22. 

Coloma,  11,  24. 

Commerce,  25,  26. 

Constitution  of  California,  1849,  12,  13  ;  1879, 
20,  21. 

Cortes,  1. 

Crocker,  C.  F.,  18  n. 

Drake,.  Sir  F.,  3. 
Drakes  Hay,  :!. 

"  Forty-niners,"  11. 

Franciscans  in  California,  3-6. 

Fremont,  John  C.,  in  California,  8,  9  ;  rela 
tion  to  the  Bear  Flag  Party,  '8,  9 ;  in 
southern  California,  10 ;  United  States 
senator,  13. 

Fruit,  5,  7,  24. 

Gold,  discovered  by  Marshall,  10,  11  ;  effects 
of  discovery.  10,  11,  17;  later  mining,  24. 
Golden  Gate,  10,  25,  26. 
Gwin,  W.  M.,  13,  16. 


Hearst,  Mrs.  Phrebe  A.,  & 
Hopkins,  M..  Is  n. 
Huntington,  C.  P.,  18  n. 

Ide,  W.  B.,  9. 
Indians,  5. 

Jesuits,  3. 

Jones,  Commodore,  at  Monterey,  7,  8. 

Judah,  T.,  18  n. 

King,  James,  14. 

Land   titles,    troubles   over,    15,   16 ;    Land 

Commission  of  1851,  16. 
Law  and  Order  Party,  14. 
Leland  Stanford  Junior  University,  22,  23. 
Lick,  James,  22. 
Los  Angeles,  founded,  5;    transcontinental 

railroad  through,  18 ;   normal  school,  22  ; 

oil  well  at,  24. 
Low,  F.,  17. 

Lower  California,  1,  3,  4. 
Lynch  law,  13,  14. 

Manufacturing  in  California.  24,  25. 

Marshall,  James  W.,  10,  11. 

Marys  ville,  11. 

Marysville  Buttes,  8. 

Merrltt,  1). 

Mexican     government    in     California,    5-9; 

overthrows  the  missions,  5,  6 ;  hatred  of 

Americans,  7,  8. 

Mexicans,  life  in  California,  6,  7,  15. 
Mills,  D.  0.,  22. 
Mining,    of  gold,    10-12,    23,    24;    of   other 

minerals,  24. 

Missionaries,  Jesuits,  3  ;  Franciscans,  3-6.     - 
Missions,   established,  3-5;   overthrown     5, 

6 ;  life  in.  5,  21,  24. 
Monterey,  3,  4,  7,  9,  10,  12. 

Naming  California,  1. 
New  Almaden,  24. 

Oakland,  22. 
Oregon,  the,  25. 

Pacific    railroads,   construction  of,    17,  18; 

builders,   IS  n. ;    political  influences,   18, 

21. 

Palo  Alto,  22. 
Pony  express,  17. 
Population,  5,  6,  11,  12,  13. 
Products  of  California,  5,  7,  10,  23-25. 


McM.  HIST.— 29. 


27 


28 


INDEX  TO  CALIFORNIA   SUPPLEMENT 


Riley,  General,  12. 
Russians,  6. 

Sacramento,  founded,  10 ;  made  the  capital, 
12;  squatter  troubles,  15, 16;  constitutional 
convention  in,  20. 

St.  Helena,  24. 

San  Diego,  bay  discovered,  3 ;  mission 
founded,  4,  5 ;  normal  school  at,  22. 

San  Francisco,  bay  discovered,  3,  4 ;  mission 
at,  5 ;  desired  by  the  United  States,  7 ; 
great  growth,  14 ;  vigilance  committee  of 
1856,  14,  15;  land  titles,  16;  anti-Chinese 
disturbances,  19,  20;  normal  school,  22; 
commerce  and  manufacturing,  25,  26. 

San  Jose,  5,  12,  22. 

San  Luis  Obispo,  5. 

San  Rafael,  5. 

"  Sand-lot  orators,"  19. 

Santa  Barbara,  3,- 5,  6. 

Santa  Paula,  24. 

Schools,  21-23. 


Serra,  Junipero,  3,  4. 

Sloat,  Commodore,  9. 

Sonoma,  8,  9,  10. 

Southern  Pacific  Company,  18. 

Spaniards,  discover  and  explore  California, 

1,3;  period  of,  6,  15. 
Squatter  disturbances,  15,  16. 
Stanford,  Leland,  17,  18  n.,  22. 
Stanford,  Mrs.  Jane  L.,  22. 
Stockton, 11. 

Stockton,  Commodore,  10. 
Sutter,  John  A.,  Mexican  grantee,  10;  di& 

covery  of  gold,  10,  11. 
Sutler's  Fort,  9,  10,  11. 

University  of  California,  22. 

Vallejo,  M.  G.,  8,  9. 

Vigilance  Committee,  13-15,  20. 

Workingmen's  Party,  19,  20. 


APPENDIX 


THE  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE  — 1776 


IN  CONGRESS,  JULY  4,  1776. 
THE  UNANIMOUS  DECLARATION  OF   THE  THIRTEEN  UNITED  STATES  OP 

AMERICA 

WHEN,  in  the  course  of  human  events,  it  becomes  necessary  for  one 
people  to  dissolve  the  political  bands  which  have  connected  them  with 
another,  and  to  assume,  among  the  powers  of  the  earth,  the  separate  and 
equal  station  to  which  the  laws  of  nature  and  of  nature's  God  entitle 
them,  a  decent  respect  to  the  opinions  of  mankind  requires  that  they 
should  declare  the  causes  which  impel  them  to  the  separation. 

We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident:  that  all  men  are  created 
equal ;  that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator  with  certain  unalienable 
rights  ;  that  among  these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness. 
That,  to  secure  these  rights,  governments  are  instituted  among  men, 
deriving  their  just  powers  from  the  consent  of  the  governed  ;  that,  when 
ever  any  form  of  government  becomes  destructive  of  these  ends,  it  is  the 
right  of  the  people  to  alter  or  to  abolish  it,  and  to  institute  new  govern 
ment,  laying  its  foundation  on  such  principles,  and  organizing  its  powers 
in  such  form,  as  to  them  shall  seem  most  likely  to  effect  their  safety  and 
happiness.  Prudence,  indeed,  will  dictate  that  governments  long  estab 
lished,  should  not  be  changed  for  light  and  transient  causes ;  and,  ac 
cordingly,  all  experience  hath  shown,  that  mankind  are  more  disposed  to 
suffer,  while  evils  are  sufferable,  than  to  right  themselves  by  abolishing 
the  forms  to  which  they  are  accustomed.  But,  when  a  long  train  of 
abuses  and  usurpations,  pursuing  invariably  the  same  object,  evinces  a 
design  to  reduce  them  under  absolute  despotism,  it  is  their  right,  it  is 
their  duty,  to  throw  off  such  government,  and  to  provide  new  guards  for 
their  future  security.  —  Such  has  been  the  patient  sufferance  of  these 
colonies  ;  and  such  is  now  the  necessity  which  constrains  them  to  alter 
their  former  systems  of  government.  The  history  of  the  present  king 
of  Great  Britain  is  a  history  of  repeated  injuries  and  usurpations,  all  hav- 

1 


THE   DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE 

ing  in  direct  object  the  establishment  of  an  absolute  tyranny  over  these 
States.     To  prove  this,  let  facts  be  submitted  to  a  candid  world. 

He  has  refused  his  assent  to  laws  the  most  wholesome  and  necessary 
for  the  public  good. 

He  has  forbidden  his  governors  to  pass  laws  of  immediate  and  pressing 
importance,  unless  suspended  in  their  operation  till  his  assent  should  be 
obtained  ;  and,  when  so  suspended,  he  has  utterly  neglected  to  attend  to 
them. 

He  has  refused  to  pass  other  laws  for  the  accommodation  of  large  dis 
tricts  of  people,  unless  those  people  would  relinquish  the  right  of  repre 
sentation  in  the  legislature,  a  right  inestimable  to  them  and  formidable 
to  tyrants  only. 

He  has  called  together  legislative  bodies  at  places  unusual,  uncomfort 
able,  and  distant  from  the  depository  of  their  public  records,  for  the  sole 
purpose  of  fatiguing  them  into  compliance  with  his  measures. 

He  has  dissolved  representative  houses  repeatedly,  for  opposing,  with 
manly  firmness,  his  invasions  on  the  rights  of  the  people. 

He  has  refused,  for  a  long  time  after  such  dissolutions,  to  cause  others 
to  be  elected ;  whereby  the  legislative  powers,  incapable  of  annihilation, 
have  returned  to  the  people  at  large  for  their  exercise  ;  the  State  remain 
ing,  in  the  meantime,  exposed  to  all  the  dangers  of  invasion  from  with 
out,  and  convulsions  within. 

He  has  endeavored  to  prevent  the  population  of  these  States  ;  for  that 
purpose  obstructing  the  laws  for  naturalization  of  foreigners  ;  refusing  to 
pass  others  to  encourage  their  migration  hither,  and  raising  the  conditions 
of  new  appropriations  of  lands. 

He  has  obstructed  the  administration  of  justice,  by  refusing  his  assent 
to  laws  for  establishing  judiciary  powers. 

He  has  made  judges  dependent  on  his  will  alone  for  the  tenure  of  their 
offices,  and  the  amount  and  payment  of  their  salaries. 

He  has  erected  a  multitude  of  new  offices,  and  sent  hither  swarms  of 
officers  to  harass  our  people,  and  eat  out  their  substance. 

He  has  kept  among  us  in  times  of  peace,  standing  armies,  without  the 
consent  of  our  legislature. 

He  has  affected  to  render  the  military  independent  of,  and  superior  to, 
the  civil  power. 

He  has  combined,  with  others,  to  subject  us  to  a  jurisdiction  foreign 
to  our  constitution,  and  unacknowledged  by  our  laws ;  giving  his  assent 
to  their  acts  of  pretended  legislation  : 

For  quartering  large  bodies  of  armed  troops  among  us  : 

For  protecting  them,  by  a  mock  trial,  from  punishment  for  any  mur 
ders  which  they  should  commit  on  the  inhabitants  of  these  States : 

2 


i f 

THE  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE 

For  cutting  off  our  trade  with  all  parts  of  the  world : 

For  imposing  taxes  on  us  without  our  consent : 

For  depriving  us,  in  many  cases,  of  the  benefits  of  trial  by  jury: 

For  transporting  us  beyond  seas  to  be  tried  for  pretended  offenses : 

For  abolishing  the  free  system  of  English  laws  in  a  neighboring  prov 
ince,  establishing  therein  an  arbitrary  government  and  enlarging  its 
boundaries,  so  as  to  render  it  at  once  an  example  and  fit  instrument  for 
introducing  the  same  absolute  rule  into  these  colonies : 

For  taking  away  our  charters,  abolishing  our  most  valuable  laws,  and 
altering,  fundamentally,  the  forms  of  our  governments : 

For  suspending  our  own  legislatures,  and  declaring  themselves  invested 
with  power  to  legislate  for  us  in  all  cases  whatsoever. 

He  has  abdicated  government  here  by  declaring  us  out  of  his  protec 
tion,  and  waging  war  against  us. 

He  has  plundered  our  seas,  ravaged  our  coasts,  burnt  our  towns,  and 
destroyed  the  lives  of  our  people. 

He  is,  at  this  time,  transporting  large  armies  of  foreign  mercenaries 
to  complete  the  works  of  death,  desolation,  and  tyranny,  already  begun, 
with  circumstances  of  cruelty  and  perfidy  scarcely  paralleled  in  the  most 
barbarous  ages,  and  totally  unworthy  the  head  of  a  civilized  nation. 

He  has  constrained  our  fellow-citizens,  taken  captive  on  the  high  seas, 
to  bear  arms  against  their  country,  to  become  the  executioners  of  their 
friends  and  brethren,  or  to  fall  themselves  by  their  hands. 

He  has  excited  domestic  insurrections  amongst  us,  and  has  endeavored 
to  bring  on  the  inhabitants  of  our  frontiers,  the  merciless  Indian  savages, 
whose  known  rule  of  warfare  is  an  undistinguished  destruction  of  all  ages, 
sexes,  and  conditions. 

In  every  stage  of  these  oppressions,  we  have  petitioned  for  redress  in 
the  most  humble  terms  :  our  repeated  petitions  have  been  answered  only 
by  repeated  injury.  A  prince,  whose  character  is  thus  marked  by  every 
act  which  may  define  a  tyrant,  is  unfit  to  be  the  ruler  of  a  free  people. 

Nor  have  we  been  wanting  in  attention  to  our  British  brethren.  We 
have  warned  them,  from  time  to  time,  of  attempts  by  their  legislature  to 
extend  an  unwarrantable  jurisdiction  over  us.  We  have  reminded  them 
of  the  circumstances  of  our  emigration  and  settlement  here.  We  have 
appealed  to  their  native  justice  and  magnanimity,  and  we  have  conjured 
them,  by  the  ties  of  our  common  kindred,  to  disavow  these  usurpations, 
which  would  inevitably  interrupt  our  connections  and  correspondence. 
They  too  have  been  deaf  to  the  voice  of  justice  and  consanguinity.  We 
must,  therefore,  acquiesce  in  the  necessity  which  denounces  our  separa 
tion,  and  hold  them,  as  we  hold  the  rest  of  mankind,  enemies  in  war,  in 
peace  friends. 

3 


THE  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE 

We,  therefore,  the  representatives  of  the  United  States  of  America,  in 
general  Congress  assembled,  appealing  to  the  Supreme  Judge  of  the  world 
for  the  rectitude  of  our  intentions,  do,  in  the  name,  and  by  authority  of 
the  good  people  of  these  colonies,  solemnly  publish  and  declare,  That 
these  United  Colonies  are,  and  of  right  ought  to  be,  free  and  independent 
States ;  that  they  are  absolved  from  all  allegiance  to  the  British  crown, 
and  that  all  political  connection  between  them  and  the  state  of  Great 
Britain  is,  and  ought  to  be,  totally  dissolved  ;  and  that,  as  free  and  inde 
pendent  States,  they  have  full  power  to  levy  war,  conclude  peace,  con 
tract  alliances,  establish  commerce,  and  to  do  all  other  acts  and  things 
which  independent  States  may  of  right  do.  And  for  the  support  of  this 
declaration,  with  a  firm  reliance  on  the  protection  of  Divine  Providence, 
we  mutually  pledge  to  each  other  our  lives,  our  fortunes,  and  our  sacred 
honor.  JOHN  HANCOCK. 


New  Hampshire 
Josiah  Bartlett, 
Wm.  Whipple, 
Matthew  Thornton. 

Massachusetts  Bay 
Saml.  Adams, 
John  Adams, 
Robt.  Treat  Paine, 
Elbridge  Gerry. 

Rhode  Island 
Step.  Hopkins, 
William  Ellery. 

Connecticut 
Roger  Sherman, 
Sam'el  Huntington, 
Win.  Williams, 
Oliver  Wolcott. 

New  York 
Wm.  Floyd, 
Phil.  Livingston, 
Frans.  Lewis, 
Lewis  Morris. 


New  Jersey 
Richd.  Stockton, 
Jno.  Witherspoon, 
Fras.  Hopkinson, 
John  Hart, 
Abra.  Clark. 

Pennsylvania 
Robt.  Morris, 
Benjamin  Rush, 
Benja.  Franklin, 
John  Morton, 
Geo.  Clymer, 
Jas.  Smith, 
Geo.  Taylor, 
James  Wilson, 
Geo.  Ross. 

Delaware 
Csesar  Rodney, 
Geo.  Read, 
Tho.  M'Kean. 

Maryland 
Samuel  Chase, 
Wm.  Paca, 
Thos.  Stone, 
4 


Charles  Carroll  of  Car- 
rollton. 

Virginia 
George  Wythe, 
Richard  Henry  Lee, 
Th  Jefferson, 
Benja.  Harrison, 
Thos.  Nelson,  jr., 
Francis  Lightfoot  Lee, 
Carter  Braxton. 

North  Carolina 
Wm.  Hooper, 
Joseph  Hewes, 
John  Penn. 

South  Carolina 
Edward  Rutledge, 
Thos.  Heyward,  Junr., 
Thomas  Lynch,  Junr., 
Arthur  Middleton. 

Georgia 

Button  Gwinnett, 
Lyman  Hall, 
Geo.  Walton. 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  — 17871 


WE  the  people  of  the  United  States,  in  order  to  form  a  more  perfect 
union,  establish  justice,  insure  domestic  tranquillity,  provide  for  the  com 
mon  defense,  promote  the  general  welfare,  and  secure  the  blessings  of 
liberty  to  ourselves  and  our  posterity,  do  ordain  and  establish  this  Con 
stitution  for  the  United  States  of  America. 

ARTICLE    I 

SECTION  1.  All  legislative  powers  herein  granted  shall  be  vested  in 
a  Congress  of  the  United  States,  which  shall  consist  of  a  Senate  and 
House  of  Representatives. 

SECTION  2.  1  The  House  of  Representatives  shall  be  composed  of 
members  chosen  every  second  year  by  the  people  of  the  several  States, 
and  the  electors  in  each  State  shall  have  the  qualifications. requisite  for 
electors  of  the  most  numerous  branch  of  the  State  legislature. 

2  No  person  shall  be  a  representative  who  shall  not  have  attained  to 
the  age  of  twenty-five  years,  and  been  seven  years  a  citizen  of  the  United 
States,  and  who  shall  not,  when  elected,  be  an  inhabitant  of  that  State  in 
which  he  shall  be  chosen. 

3  Representatives  and  direct  taxes  shall  be  apportioned  among  the 
several  States  which  may  be  included  within  this  Union,  according  to 
their  respective  numbers,  which  shall  be  determined  by  adding  to  the 
whole  number  of  free  persons,  including  those  bound  to  service  for  a  term 
of  years,  and  excluding  Indians  not  taxed,  three  fifths  of  all  other  per 
sons.2    The  actual  enumeration  shall  be  made  within  three  years  after 
the  first  meeting  of  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  and  within  every 
subsequent  term  of  ten  years,  in  such  manner  as  they  shall  by  law  direct. 
The  number  of  representatives  shall  not  exceed  one  for  every  thirty 
thousand,  but  each  State  shall  have  at  least  one  representative  ;  and  until 
such  enumeration  shall  be  made,  the  State  of  New  Hampshire  shall  be 
entitled  to  choose  three,  Massachusetts  eight,  Rhode  Island  and  Provi 
dence  Plantations  one,  Connecticut  five,  New  York  six.  New  Jersey  four, 
Pennsylvania  eight,  Delaware  one,  Maryland  six,  Virginia  ten,  North 
Carolina  five,  South  Carolina  five,  and  Georgia  three. 

4  When  vacancies  happen  in  the  representation  from  any  State,  the 
executive   authority   thereof  shall  issue   writs  of   election   to   fill  such 
vacancies. 

5  The  House  of  Representatives  shall  choose  their  speaker  and  other 
officers,  and  shall  have  the  sole  power  of  impeachment. 

SECTION  3.  1  The  Senate  of  the  United  States  shall  be  composed  of 
two  senators  from  each  State,  chosen  by  the  legislature  thereof  for  six 
years  ;  and  each  senator  shall  have  one  vote. 

1  This  reprint  of  the  Constitution  exactly  follows  the  text  of  that  in  the 
Department  of  State  at  Washington,  save  in  the  spelling  of  a  few  words. 

2  The  last  half  of  this  sentence  was  superseded  by  the  13th  aud  14th  Amend 
ments.     (See  p.  16  following.) 

5 


CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   UNITED   STATES 

2  Immediately  after  they  shall  be  assembled  in  consequence  of  the 
first  election,   they  shall  be  divided  as   equally  as  may  be  into  three 
classes.     The  seats  of  the  senators  of  the  first  class  shall  be  vacated  at 
the  expiration  of  the  second  year,  of  the  second  class  at  the  expiration  of 
the  fourth  year,  and  of  the  third  class  at  the  expiration  of  the  sixth  year, 
so  that  one  third  may  be  chosen  every  second  year ;  and  if  vacancies 
happen  by  resignation,  or  otherwise,  during  the  recess  of  the  legislature 
of  any  State,  the  executive  thereof  may  make  temporary  appointments 
until  the   next  meeting  of  the   legislature,  which  shall   then  fill  such 
vacancies. 

3  No  person  shall  be  a  senator  who  shall  not  have  attained  to  the  age 
of  thirty  years,  and  been  nine  years  a  citizen  of  the  United  States,  and 
who  shall  not,  when  elected,  be  an  inhabitant  of  that  State  for  which  he 
shall  be  chosen. 

4  The  Vice  President  of  the  United  States  shall  be  President  of  the 
Senate,  but  shall  have  no  vote,  unless  they  be  equally  divided. 

5  The  Senate  shall  choose  their  other  officers,  and  also  a  president  pro 
tempore,  in  the  absence  of  the  Vice  President,  or  when  he  shall  exercise 
the  office  of  President  of  the  United  States. 

6  The  Senate  shall  have  the  sole  power  to  try  all  impeachments. 
When  sitting  for  that  purpose,   they  shall  be  on  oath  or  affirmation. 
When  the  President  of  the  United  States  is  tried,  the  chief  justice  shall 
preside :  and  no  person  shall  be  convicted  without  the  concurrence  of  two 
thirds  of  the  members  present. 

7  Judgment  in  cases  of  impeachment  shall  not  extend  further  than  to 
removal  from  office,  and  disqualification  to  hold  and  enjoy  any  office  of 
honor,  trust  or  profit  under  the  United  States :  but  the  party  convicted 
shall  nevertheless  be  liable  and  subject  to  indictment,  trial,  judgment  and 
punishment,  according  to  law. 

SECTION  4.  1  The  times,  places,  and  manner  of  holding  elections  for 
senators  and  representatives,  shall  be  prescribed  in  each  State  by  the 
legislature  thereof ;  but  the  Congress  may  at  any  time  by  law  make  or 
alter  such  regulations,  except  as  to  the  places  of  choosing  senators. 

2  The  Congress  shall  assemble  at  least  once  in  every  year,  and  such 
meeting  shall  be  on  the  first  Monday  in  December,  unless  they  shall  by 
law  appoint  a  different  day. 

SECTION  5.  1  Each  House  shall  be  the  judge  of  the  elections,  returns 
and  qualifications  of  its  own  members,  and  a  majority  of  each  shall  con 
stitute  a  quorum  to  do  business  ;  but  a  smaller  number  may  adjourn  from 
day  to  day,  and  may  be  authorized  to  compel  the  attendance  of  absent 
members,  in  such  manner,  and  under  such  penalties  as  each  House  may 
provide. 

2  Each  House  may  determine  the  rules  of  its  proceedings,  punish  its 
members  for  disorderly  behavior,  and,  with  the  concurrence  of  two  thirds, 
expel  a  member. 

3  Each  House  shall  keep  a  journal  of  its  proceedings,  and  from  time 
to  time  publish  the  same,  excepting  such  parts  as  may  in  their  judgment 
require  secrecy;  and  the  yeas  and  nays  of  the  members  of  either  House 
on  any  question  shall,  at  the  desire  of   one  fifth  of  those  present,  be 
entered  on  the  journal. 

4  Neither  House,  during  the  session  of  Congress,  shall,  without  the 
consent  of  the  other,  adjourn  for  more  than  three  days,  nor  to  any  other 
place  than  that  in  which  the  two  Houses  shall  be  sitting. 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

SECTION  6.  1  The  senators  and  representatives  shall  receive  a  com 
pensation  for  their  services,  to  be  ascertained  by  law,  and  paid  out  of  the 
Treasury  of  the  United  States.  They  shall  in  all  cases,  except  treason, 
felony  and  breach  of  the  peace,  be  privileged  from  arrest  during  their 
attendance  at  the  session  of  their  respective  Houses,  and  in  going  to  and 
returning  from  the  same  ;  and  for  any  speech  or  debate  in  either  House, 
they  shall  not  be  questioned  in  any  other  place. 

2  No  senator  or  representative  shall,  during  the  time  for  which  he 
was  elected,  be  appointed  to  any  civil  office  under  the  authority  of  the 
United  States,  which  shall  have  been  created,  or  the  emoluments  whereof 
shall  have  been  increased  during  such  time  ;  and  no  person  holding  any 
office  under  the  United  States  shall  be  a  member  of  either  House  during 
his  continuance  in  office. 

SECTION  7.  1  All  bills  for  raising  revenue  shall  originate  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  ;  but  the  Senate  may  propose  or  concur  with 
amendments  as  on  other  bills. 

2  Every  bill  which  shall  have  passed  the  House  of  Representatives  and 
the  Senate,  shall,  before  it  become  a  law,  be  presented  to  the  President 
of  the  United  States ;  if  he  approve  he  shall  sign  it,  but  if  not  he  shall 
return  it,  with  his  objections  to  that  House  in  which  it  shall  have  origi 
nated,  who  shall  enter  the  objections  at  large  on  their  journal,  and  proceed 
to  reconsider  it.     If  after  such  reconsideration  two  thirds  of  that  House 
shall  agree  to  pass  the  bill,  it  shall  be  sent,  together  with  the  objections, 
to  the  other  House,  by  which  it  shall  likewise  be  reconsidered,  and  if 
approved  by  two  thirds  of  that  House,  it  shall  become  a  law.     But  in  all 
such  cases  the  votes  of  both  Houses  shall  be  determined  by  yeas  and  nays, 
and  the  names  of  the  persons  voting  for  and  against  the  bill  shall  be  en 
tered  on  the  journal  of  each  House  respectively.     If  any  bill  shall  not  be 
returned  by  the  President  within  ten  days  (Sundays  excepted)  after  it 
shall  have  been  presented  to  him,  the  same  shall  be  a  law,  in  like  manner 
as  if  he  had  signed  it,  unless  the  Congress  by  their  adjournment  prevent 
its  return,  in  which  case  it  shall  not  be  a  law. 

3  Every  order,  resolution,  or  vote  to  which  the  concurrence  of  the 
Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  may  be  necessary  (except  on  a  ques 
tion  of  adjournment)  shall  be  presented  to  the  President  of  the  United 
States ;  and  before  the  same  shall  take  effect,  shall  be  approved  by  him, 
or  being  disapproved  by  him,  shall  be  repassed  by  two  thirds  of  the  Senate 
and  House  of  Representatives,  according  to  the  rules  and  limitations  pre 
scribed  in  the  case  of  a  bill. 

SECTION  8.  1  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  lay  and  collect 
taxes,  duties,  imposts  and  excises,  to  pay  the  debts  and  provide  for  the 
common  defense  and  general  welfare  of  the  United  States  ;  but  all  duties, 
imposts  and  excises  shall  be  uniform  throughout  the  United  States ; 

2  To  borrow  money  on  the  credit  of  the  United  States  ; 

3  To  regulate  commerce  with  foreign  nations,  and  among  the  several 
States,  and  with  the  Indian  tribes  ; 

4  To  establish  an  uniform  rule  of  naturalization,  and  uniform  laws  on 
the  subject  of  bankruptcies  throughout  the  United  States ; 

5  To  coin  money,  regulate  the  value  thereof,  and  of  foreign  coin,  and 
fix  the  standard  of  weights  and  measures ; 

6  To  provide  for  the  punishment  of  counterfeiting  the  securities  and 
current  coin  of  the  United  States  ; 

7  To  establish  post  offices  and  post  roads  ; 

7 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

8  To  promote  the  progress  of  science  and  useful  arts  by  securing  for 
limited  times  to  authors  and  inventors  the  exclusive  right  to  their  respec 
tive  writings  and  discoveries ; 

9  To  constitute  tribunals  inferior  to  the  Supreme  Court ; 

10  To  define  and  punish  piracies  and  felonies  committed  on  the  high 
seas,  and  offenses  against  the  law  of  nations ; 

11  To  declare  war,  grant  letters  of  marque  and  reprisal,  and  make 
rules  concerning  captures  on  land  and  water  ; 

12  To  raise  and  support  armies,  but  no  appropriation  of  money  to  that 
use  shall  be  for  a  longer  term  than  two  years ; 

13  To  provide  and  maintain  a  navy  ; 

14  To  make  rules  for  the  government  and  regulation  of  the  land  and 
naval  forces ; 

15  To  provide  for  calling  forth  the  militia  to  execute  the  laws  of  the 
Union,  suppress  insurrections  and  repel  invasions ; 

16  To  provide  for  organizing,  arming,  and  disciplining  the  militia,  and 
for  governing  such  part  of  them  as  may  be  employed  in  the  service  of  the 
United  States,  reserving  to  the  States  respectively  the  appointment  of  the 
officers,  and  the  authority  of  training  the  militia  according  to  the  disci 
pline  prescribed  by  Congress ; 

17  To  exercise  exclusive  legislation  in  all  cases  whatsoever,  over  such 
district  (not  exceeding  ten  miles  square)  as  may,  by  cession  of  particular 
States  and  the  acceptance  of  Congress,  become  the  seat  of  the  government 
of  the  United  States,1  and  to  exercise  like  authority  over  all  places  pur 
chased  by  the  consent  of  the  legislature  of  the  State  in  which  the  same 
shall  be,  for  the  erection  of  forts,  magazines,  arsenals,  dockyards,  and 
other  needful  buildings  ;  and 

18  To  make  all  laws  which  shall  be  necessary  and  proper  for  carrying 
into  execution  the  foregoing  powers,  and  all  other  powers  vested  by  this 
Constitution  in  the  government  of  the  United  States,  or  in  any  department 
or  officer  thereof. 

SECTION  9.  1  The  migration  or  importation  of  such  persons  as  any 
of  the  States  now  existing  shall  think  proper  to  admit,  shall  not  be  pro 
hibited  by  the  Congress  prior  to  the  year  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and 
eight,  but  a  tax  or  duty  may  be  imposed  on  such  importation,  not  exceed 
ing  ten  dollars  for  each  person.2 

2  The  privilege  of  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus  shall  not  be  suspended, 
unless  when  in  cases  of  rebellion  or  invasion  the  public  safety  may  re 
quire  it. 

3  No  bill  of  attainder  or  ex  post  facto  law  shall  be  passed. 

4  No  capitation,  or  other  direct,  tax  shall  be  laid,  unless  in  proportion 
to  the  census  or  enumeration  hereinbefore  directed  to  be  taken. 

5  No  tax  or  duty  shall  be  laid  on  articles  exported  from  any  State. 

6  No  preference  shall  be  given  by  any  regulation  of  commerce  or  reve 
nue  to  the  ports  of  one  State  over  those  of  another :  nor  shall  vessels 
bound  to,  or  from,  one  State  be  obliged  to  enter,  clear,  or  pay  duties  in 
another. 

7  No  money  shall  be  drawn  from  the  treasury,  but  in  consequence  of 
appropriations  made  by  law  ;  and  a  regular  statement  and  account  of  the 

1  The  District  of  Columbia,  which  comes  under  these  regulations,  had  not 
then  been  erected. 

2  A  temporary  clause,  no  longer  in  force.   See  also  Article  V,  p.  12  following. 

8 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

receipts  and  expenditures  of  all  public  money  shall  be  published  from  time 
to  time. 

8  No  title  of  nobility  shall  be  granted  by  the  United  States :  and  no 
person  holding  any  office  of  profit  or  trust  under  them,  shall,  without  the 
consent  of  the  Congress,  accept  of  any  present,  emolument,  office,  or  title, 
of  any  kind  whatever,  from  any  king,  prince,  or  foreign  State. 

SECTION  10. 1  1  No  State  shall  enter  into  any  treaty,  alliance,  or  con 
federation  ;  grant  letters  of  marque  and  reprisal ;  coin  money  ;  emit  bills 
of  credit ;  make  anything  but  gold  and  silver  coin  a  tender  in  payment  of 
debts  ;  pass  any  bill  of  attainder,  ex  post  facto  law,  or  law  impairing  the 
obligation  of  contracts,  or  grant  any  title  of  nobility. 

2  No  State  shall,  without  the  consent  of  the  Congress,  lay  any  imposts 
or  duties  on  imports  or  exports,  except  what  may  be  absolutely  necessary 
for  executing  its  inspection  laws :  and  the  net  produce  of  all  duties  and 
imposts  laid  by  any  State  on  imports  or  exports,  shall  be  for  the  use  of 
the  treasury  of  the  United  States  ;  and  all  sucli^  laws  shall  be  subject  to 
the  revision  and  control  of  the  Congress. 

3  No  State  shall,  without  the  consent  of  Congress,  lay  any  duty  of 
tonnage,  keep  troops,  or  ships  of  war  in  time  of  peace,  enter  into  any 
agreement  or  compact  with  another  State,  or  with  a  foreign  power,  or 
engage  in  war,  unless  actually  invaded,  or  in  such  imminent  danger  as 
will  not  admit  of  delay. 

ARTICLE   II 

SECTION  1.  1  The  executive  power  shall  be  vested  in  a  President  of 
the  United  States  of  America.  He  shall  hold  his  office  during  the  term  of 
four  years,  and,  together  with  the  Vice  President,  chosen  for  the  same 
term,  be  elected,  as  follows 

2  Each  State  shall  appoint,  in  such  manner  as  the  legislature  thereof 
may  direct,  a  number  of  electors,  equal  to  the  whole  number  of  senators 
and  representatives  to  which  the  State  may  be  entitled  in  the  Congress : 
but  no  senator  or  representative,  or  person  holding  an  office  of  trust  or 
profit  under  the  United  States,  shall  be  appointed  an  elector. 

The  electors  shall  meet  in  their  respective  States,  and  vote  by  ballot 
for  two  persons,  of  whom  one  at  least  shall  not  be  an  inhabitant  of  the 
same  State  with  themselves.  And  they  shall  make  a  list  of  all  the  per 
sons  voted  for,  and  of  the  number  of  votes  for  each  ;  which  list  they  shall 
sign  and  certify,  and  transmit  sealed  to  the  seat  of  the  government  of  the 
United  States,  directed  to  the  president  of  the  Senate.  The  president  of  the 
Senate,  shall,  in  the  presence  of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives, 
open  all  the  certificates,  and  the  votes  shall  then  be  counted.  The  person 
having  the  greatest  number  of  votes  shall  be  the  President,  if  such  number 
be  a  majority  of  the  whole  number  of  electors  appointed  ;  and  if  there  be 
more  than  one  who  have  such  majority,  and  have  an  equal  number  of 
votes,  then  the  House  of  Representatives  shall  immediately  choose  by 
ballot  one  of  them  for  President ;  and  if  no  person  have  a  majority,  then 
from  the  five  highest  on  the  list  the  said  house  shall  in  like  manner  choose 
the  President.  But  in  choosing  the  President,  the  votes  shall  be  taken 
by  States,  the  representation  from  each  State  having  one  vote  ;  a  quorum 
for  this  purpose  shall  consist  of  a  member  or  members  from  two  thirds  of 
the  States,  and  a  majority  of  all  the  States  shall  be  necessary  to  a  choice. 

1  See  also  the  10th,  13th,  14th,  and  15th  Amendments,  pp.  15,  16  following. 

9 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE   UNITED    STATES 

fn  every  case,  after  the  choice  of  the  President,  the  person  having  the 
greatest  number  of  votes  of  the  electors  shall  be  the  Vice  President.  But 
if  there  should  remain  two  or  more  who  have  equal  votes,  the  Senate 
shall  choose  from  them  by  ballot  the  Vice  President.1 

3  The  Congress  may  determine  the  time  of  choosing  the  electors,  and 
the  day  on  which  they  shall  give  their  votes ;  which  day  shall  be  the  same 
throughout  the  United  States. 

4  No  person  except  a  natural  born  citizen,  or  a  citizen  of  the  United 
States,  at  the  time  of  the  adoption  of  this  Constitution,  shall  be  eligible  to 
the  office  of  President ;  neither  shall  any  person  be  eligible  to  that  office 
who  shall  not  have  attained  to  the  age  of  thirty -five  years,  and  been  four 
teen  years  a  resident  within  the  United  States. 

5  In  case  of  the  removal  of  the  President  from  office,  or  of  his  death, 
resignation,  or  inability  to  discharge  the  powers  and  duties  of  the  said 
office,  the  same  shall  devolve  on  the  Vice  President,  and  the  Congress 
may.  by  law  provide  for,  the  case  of  removal,  death,  resignation,  or  ina 
bility,  both  of  the  President  and  Vice  President,  declaring  what  officer 
shall  then  act  as  President,  and  such  officer  shall  act  accordingly,  until 
the  disability  be  removed,  or  a  President  shall  be  elected. 

6  The  President  shall,  at  stated  times,  receive  for  his  services  a  com 
pensation,  which  shall  neither  be  increased  nor  diminished  during  the 
period  for  which  he  shall  have  been  elected,  and  he  shall  not  receive 
within  that  period  any  other  emolument  from  the  United  States,  or  any 
of  them. 

7  Before  he  enter  on  the  execution  of  his  office,  he  shall  take  the  fol 
lowing  oath  or  affirmation:  —  "I  do  solemnly  swear  (or  affirm)  that  I 
will  faithfully  execute  the  office  of  President  "of  the  United  States,  and 
will  to  the  best  of  my  ability,  preserve,  protect  and  defend  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States." 

SECTION-  2.  1  The  President  shall  be  commander  in  chief  of  the 
army  and  navy  of  the  United  States,  and  of  the  militia  of  the  several 
States,  when  called  into  the  actual  service  of  the  United  States ;  he  may 
require  the  opinion,  in  writing,  of  the  principal  officer  in  each  of  the 
executive  departments,  upon  any  subject  relating  to  the  duties  of  their 
respective  offices,  and  he  shall  haVe  power  to  grant  reprieves  and  pardons 
for  offenses  against  the  United  States,  except  in  cases  of  impeachment. 

"2  He  shall  have  power,  by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of  the 
Senate,  to  make  treaties,  provided  two  thirds  of  the  senators  present  con 
cur;  and  he  shall  nominate,  and  by  and  with  the  advice  and  consent  of 
the  Senate,  shall  appoint  ambassadors,  other  public  ministers  and  consuls, 
judges  of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  all  other  officers  of  the  United  States, 
whose  appointments  are  not  herein  otherwise  provided  for,  and  which 
shall  be  established  by  law:  but  the  Congress  may  by  law  vest  the 
appointment  of  such  inferior  officers,  as  they  think  proper,  in  the  Presi 
dent  alone,  in  the  courts  of  law,  or  in  the  heads  of  departments. 

3  The  President  shall  have  power  to  fill  up  all  vacancies  that  may 
happen  during  the  recess  of  the  Senate,  by  granting  commissions  which 
shall  expire  at  the  end  of  their  next  session. 

SECTION  3.  He  shall  from  time  to  time  give  to  the  Congress  infor 
mation  of  the  state  of  the  Union,  and  recommend  to  their  consideration 
such  D  shall  judge  ueces-sary  and  expedient ;  he  may.  on 

1  This  paragraph  superseded  by  the  12th  Amendment,  p.  15  following. 

10 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

extraordinary  occasions,  convene  both  Houses,  or  either  of  them,  and  in 
case  of  disagreement  between  them  with  respect  to  the  time  of  adjourn 
ment,  he  may  adjourn  them  to  such  time  as  he  shall  think  proper  ;  he 
shall  receive  ambassadors  and  other  public  ministers  ;  he  shall  take  care 
that  the  laws  be  faithfully  executed,  and  shall  commission  all  the  officers 
of  the  United  States. 

SECTION  4.  The  President,  Vice  President,  and  all  civil  officers  of  the 
United  States,  shall  be  removed  from  office  on  impeachment  for,  and  con 
viction  of,  treason,  bribery,  or  other  high  crimes  and  misdemeanors. 

ARTICLE   III 

SECTION  1.  The  judicial  power  of  the  United  States  shall  be  vested 
in  one  Supreme  Court,  and  in  such  inferior  courts  as  the  Congress  may 
from  time  to  time  ordain  and  establish.  The  judges,  both  of  the  Supreme 
and  inferior  courts,  shall  hold  their  offices  during  good  behavior,,  and 
shall,  at  stated  times,  receive  for  their  services,  a  compensation  which 
shall  not  be  diminished  during  their  continuance  in  office. 

-  TIOX  2.     1    The  judicial  power  shall  extend  to  all  cases,  in  law  and 
equity,  arising  under  this  Constitution,  the  laws  of  the  United  States, 
and  treaties  made,  or  which  shall  be  made,  under  their  authority ;  —  to 
all  cases  affecting  ambassadors,  other  public  ministers  and  consuls ;  — 
to  all  cases  of  admiralty  and  maritime  jurisdiction  ;  —  to  controversies  to 
which  the  United  States  shall  be  a  party  ;  — to  controversies  between  two 
or  more  States  ;  —  between  a  State  and  citizens  of  another  State  ; !  —  be 
tween  citizens  of  different  States. — between  citizens  of  the  samt 
claiming  lands  under  grants  of  different  States,  and  between  a  State,  or 
the  citizens  thereof,  and  foreign  States,  citizens  or  subjects. 

2  In  all  cases  affecting  ambassadors,  other  public  ministers  and  con 
suls,  and  those  in  which  a  State  shall  be  party,  the  Supreme  Court  shall 
have  original  jurisdiction.     In  all  the  other  cases  before  mentioned,  the 
Supreme  Court  shall  have  appellate  jurisdiction,  both  as  to  law  and  fact, 
with  such  exceptions,  and  under  such  regulations  as  the  Congress  shall 
make. 

3  The  trial  of  all  crimes,  except  in  cases  of  impeachment,  shall  be  by 
jury  ;  and  such  trial  shall  be  held  in  the  State  where  the  said  crimes  shall 
have  been  committed ;   but  when  not  committed  within  any  State,  the 
trial  shall  be  at  such  place  or  places  as  the  Congress  may  by  law  have 
directed. 

-  TION  3.     1   Treason  against  the  United  States,  shall  consist  only  in 
levying  war  asrainst  them,  or  hi  adhering  to  their  enemies,  giving  them 
aid  and  comfort.    No  person  shall  be  convicted  of  treason  unless  on  the 
testimony  of  two  witnesses  to  the  same  overt  act,  or  on  confession  in 
open  court. 

2  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  declare  the  punishment  of  treason, 
but  no  attainder  of  treason  shall  work  corruption  of  blood,  or  forfeiture 
except  during  the  life  of  the  person  attainted. 

ARTICLE    IV 

SECTION  1.  Full  faith  and  credit  shall  be  given  in  each  State  to  the 
public  acts,  records,  and  judicial  proceedings  of  even*  other  State.  Arid 

1  See  the  llth  Amendment,  p.  15  following. 
11 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

the  Congress  may  by  general  laws  prescribe  the  manner  in  which  such 
acts,  records  and  proceedings  shall  be  proved,  and  the  effect  thereof. 

SECTION  2.  1  The  citizens  of  each  State  shall  be  entitled  to  all  privi 
leges  and  immunities  of  citizens  in  the  several  States. 

2  A  person  charged  in  any  State  with  treason,  felony,  or  other  crime, 
who  shall  flee  from  justice,  and  be  found  in  another  State,  shall  on  de 
mand  of  the  executive  authority  of  the  State  from  which  he  fled,  be 
delivered  up  to  be  removed  to  the  State  having  jurisdiction  of  the  crime. 

3  No  person  held  to  service  or  labor  in  one  State,  under  the  laws 
thereof,  escaping  into  another,  shall,  in  consequence  of  any  law  or  regu 
lation  therein,  be  discharged  from  such  service  or  labor,  but  shall  be 
delivered  up  on  claim  of  the  party  to  whom  such  service  or  labor  may 
be  due.1 

SECTION  3.  1  New  States  may  be  admitted  by  the  Congress  into  this 
Union  ;  but  no  new  State  shall  be  formed  or  erected  within  the  jurisdic 
tion  of  any  other  State  ;  nor  any  State  be  formed  by  the  junction  of  two 
or  more  States,  or  parts  of  States,  without  the  consent  of  the  legislatures 
of  the  States  concerned  as  well  as  of  the  Congress. 

2  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  dispose  of  and  make  all  needful 
rules  and  regulations  respecting  the  territory  or  other  property  belonging 
to  the  United  States ;  and  nothing  in  this  Constitution  shall  be  so  con 
strued  as  to  prejudice  any  claims  of  the  United  States,  or  of  any  particular 
State. 

SECTION  4.  The  United  States  shall  guarantee  to  every  State  in  this 
Union  a  republican  form  of  government,  and  shall  protect  each  of  them 
against  invasion ;  and  on  application  of  the  legislature,  or  of  the  execu 
tive  (when  the  legislature  cannot  be  convened)  against  domestic  violence. 

ARTICLE   V 

The  Congress,  whenever  two  thirds  of  both  Houses  shall  deem  it 
necessary,  shall  propose  amendments  to  this  Constitution,  or,  on  the 
application  of  the  legislatures  of  two  thirds  of  the  several  States,  shall 
call  a  convention  for  proposing  amendments,  which,  in  either  case,  shall 
be  valid  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  as  part  of  this  Constitution,  when 
ratified  by  the  legislatures  of  three  fourths  of  the  several  States,  or  by 
conventions  in  three  fourths  thereof,  as  the  one  or  the  other  mode  of 
ratification  may  be  proposed  by  the  Congress  ;  Provided  that  no  amend 
ment  which  may  be  made  prior  to  the  year  one  thousand  eight  hundred 
and  eight  shall  in  any  manner  affect  the  first  and  fourth  clauses  in  the 
ninth  section  of  the  first  article  ;  and  that  no  State,  without  its  consent, 
shall  be  deprived  of  its  equal  suffrage  in  the  Senate. 

ARTICLE   VI 

1  All   debts  contracted   and  engagements  entered   into,  before  the 
adoption  of  this  Constitution,  shall  be  as  valid  against  the  United  States 
under  this  Constitution,  as  under  the  Confederation. 

2  This  Constitution,  and  the  laws  of  the  United  States  which  shall  be 
made  in  pursuance  thereof  ;  and  all  treaties  made,  or  which  shall  be  made, 
under  the  authority  of  the  United  States,  shall  be  the  supreme  law  of  the 
land  ;  and  the  judges  in  every  State  shall  be  bound  thereby,  anything  in 
the  Constitution  or  laws  of  any  State  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 

1  See  the  13th  Amendment,  p.  16  following. 
12 


N  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 


3  The  senators  and  representatives  before  mentioned,  and  the  mem 
bers  of  the  several  State  legislatures,  and  all  executive  and  judicial  officers, 
both  of  the  United  States,  and  of  the  several  States,  shall  be  bound  by 
oath  or  affirmation  to  support  this  Constitution  ;  but  no  religious  test 
shall  ever  be  required  as  a  qualification  to  any  office  or  public  trust  under 
the  United  States. 

ARTICLE    VII 

The  ratification  of  the  conventions  of  nine  States  shall  be  sufficient  for 
the  establishment  of  this  Constitution  between  the  States  so  ratifying  the 
same. 

Done  in  Convention  by  the  unanimous  consent  of  the  States  present  the 
seventeenth  day  of  September  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  eighty-seven,  and  of  the  independence  of  the  United 
States  of  America  the  twelfth.  In  witness  whereof  we  have  hereunto 
subscribed  our  names, 

Go:   WASHINGTON  — 

Presidt.  and  Deputy  from  Virginia 


New  Hampshire 

John  Langdon 
Nicholas  Gilman 

Massachusetts 

Nathaniel  Gorham 
Rufus  King 

Connecticut 

Wm.  Saml.  Johnson 
Roger  Sherman 

New  York 
Alexander  Hamilton 

New  Jersey 

Wil :  Livingston 
David  Brearley 
Wm.  Paterson 
Jona:  Dayton 

Pennsylvania 

B.  Franklin 
Thomas  Mifflin 
Robt.  Morris 
Geo.  Clymer 
Thos.  Fitzsimons 
Jared  Ingersoll 
James  Wilson 
Gouv  Morris 


Attest 


Delaware 

Geo :  Read 

Gunning  Bedford  Jun 
John  Dickinson 
Richard  Bassett 
Jaco:  Broom 

Maryland 

James  Me  Henry 

Dan  of  St.  Thos  Jenifer 

Danl.  Carroll 

Virginia 

John  Blair  — 
James  Madison  Jr. 

North  Carolina 

Wm.  Blount 

Richd.  Dobbs  Spaight 

Hu  Williamson 

South  Carolina 

J.  Rutledge, 

Charles  Cotesworth  Pinckney 

Charles  Pinckney 

Pierce  Butler. 

Georgia 

William  Few 
Abr  Baldwin 
WILLIAM  JACKSON  Secretary. 


13 


CONSTITUTION   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

Articles  in  addition  to,  and  amendment  of ,  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  of  America,  proposed  by  Congress,  and  ratified  by  the  legisla 
tures  of  the  several  States  pursuant  to  the  fifth  article  of  the  original 
Constitution. 

ARTICLE    Ii 

Congress  shall  make  no  law  respecting  an  establishment  of  religion,  or 
prohibiting  the  free  exercise  thereof  ;  or  abridging  the  freedom  of  speech, 
or  of  the  press  ;  or  the  right  of  the  people  peaceably  to  assemble,  and  to 
petition  the  government  for  a  redress  of  grievances. 

ARTICLE    II 

A  well  regulated  militia,  being  necessary  to  the  security  of  a  free  State, 
the  right  of  the  people  to  keep  and  bear  arms,  shall  not  be  infringed. 

ARTICLE    III 

No  soldier  shall,  in  time  of  peace  be  quartered  in  any  house,  without 
the  consent  of  the  owner,  nor  in  time  of  war,  but  in  a  manner  to  be  pre 
scribed  by  law. 

ARTICLE   IV 

The  right  of  the  people  to  be  secure  in  their  persons,  houses,  papers, 
and  effects,  against  unreasonable  searches  and  seizures,  shall  not  be  vio 
lated,  and  no  warrants  shall  issue,  but  upon  probable  cause,  supported  by 
oatli  or  affirmation,  and  particularly  describing  the  place  to  be  searched, 
and  the  persons  or  things  to  be  seized. 

ARTICLE    V 

No  person  shall  be  held  to  answer  for  a  capital,  or  otherwise  infamous 
crime,  unless  on  a  presentment  or  indictment  of  a  grand  jury,  except  in 
case's  arising  in  the  land  or  naval  forces,  or  in  the  militia,  when  in  actual 
service  in  time  of  war  or  public  danger  ;  nor  shall  any  person  be  subject 
for  the  same  offense  to  be  twice  put  in  jeopardy  of  life  or  limb  ;  nor  shall 
be  compelled  in  any  criminal  case  to  be  a  witness  against  himself,  nor  be 
deprived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without  due  process  of  law;  nor  shall 
private  property  be  taken  for  public  use  without  just  compensation. 

ARTICLE   VI 

In  all  criminal  prosecutions,  the  accused  shall  enjoy  the  right  to  a 
speedy  and  public  trial,  by  an  impartial  jury  of  the  State  and  district 
wherein  the  crime  shall  have  been  committed,  which  district  shall  have 
been  previously  ascertained  by  law,  and  to  be"  informed  of  the  nature  and 
cause  of  the  accusation  ;  to  be  confronted  with  the  witnesses  against  him  ; 
to  have  compulsory  process  for  obtaining  witnesses  in  his  favor,  and  to 
have  the  assistance  of  counsel  for  his  defense. 

ARTICLE    VII 

In  suits  at  common  law,  where  the  value  in  controversy  shall  exceed 
twenty  dollars,  the  right  of  trial  by  jury  shall  be  preserved,  and  no  fact 
tried  by  a  jury  shall  be  otherwise  reexamined  in  any  court  of  the  United 
States,  than  according  to  the  rules  of  the  common  law. 

1  The  first  ten  Amendments  were  adopted  in  1791. 
14 


CONSTITUTION   OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

ARTICLE   VIII 

Excessive  bail  shall  not  be  required,  nor  excessive  fines  imposed,  nor 
cruel  and  unusual  punishments  inflicted. 

ARTICLE   IX 

The  enumeration  in  the  Constitution  of  certain  rights  shall  not  be 
construed  to  deny  or  disparage  others  retained  by  the  people. 

ARTICLE   X 

The  powers  not  delegated  to  the  United  States  by  the  Constitution,  nor 
prohibited  by  it  to  the  States,  are  reserved  to  the  States  respectively,  or  to 
the  people.  ARTICLE  XI' 

The  judicial  power  of  the  United  States  shall  not  be  construed  to  extend 
to  any  suit  in  law  or  equity,  commenced  or  prosecuted  against  one  of  the 
United  States  by  citizens  of  another  State,  or  by  citizens  or  subjects  of 
any  foreign  State.  AETICLEXII* 

The  electors  shall  meet  in  their  respective  States,  and  vote  by  ballot 
for  President  and  Vice  President,  one  of  whom,  at  least,  shall  not  be  an 
inhabitant  of  the  same  State  with  themselves  ;  they  shall  name  in  their 
ballots  the  person  voted  for  as  President,  and  in  distinct  ballots  the  person 
voted  for  as  Vice  President,  and  they  shall  make  distinct  lists  of  all  per 
sons  voted  for  as  President  and  of  all  persons  voted  for  as  Vice  President, 
and  of  the  number  of  votes  for  each,  which  lists  they  shall  sign  and 
certify,  and  transmit  sealed  to  the  seat  of  the  government  of  the  United 
States,  directed  to  the  president  of  the  Senate; — The  president  of  the 
Senate  shall,  in  the  presence  of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives, 
open  all  the  certificates  and  the  votes  shall  then  be  counted ;  —  The  person 
having  the  greatest  number  of  votes  for  President  shall  be  the  President, 
if  such  number  be  a  majority  of  the  whole  number  of  electors  appointed  ; 
and  if  no  person  have  such  majority,  then  from  the  persons  having  the 
highest  numbers  not  exceeding  three  on  the  list  of  those  voted  for  as 
President,  the  House  of  Representatives  shall  choose  immediately,  by 
ballot,  the  President.  But  in  choosing  the  President,  the  votes  shall  be 
taken  by  States,  the  representation  from  each  State  having  one  vote ;  a 
quorum  for  this  purpose  shall  consist  of  a  member  or  members  from  two 
thirds  of  the  States,  and  a  majority  of  all  the  States  shall  be  necessary 
to  a  choice.  And  if  the  House  of  Representatives  shall  not  choose  a 
President  whenever  the  right  of  choice  shall  devolve  upon  them,  before 
the  fourth  day  of  March  next  following,  then  the  Vice  President  shall  act 
as  President,  as  in  the  case  of  the  death  or  other  constitutional  disability 
of  the  President.  The  person  having  the  greatest  number  of  votes  as 
Vice  President  shall  be  the  Vice  President,  if  such  number  be  a  majority 
of  the  whole  number  of  electors  appointed,  and  if  no-  person  have  a 
majority,  then  from  the  two  highest  numbers  on  the  list,  the  Senate  shall 
choose  the  Vice  President ;  a  quorum  for  the  purpose  shall  consist  of  two 
thirds  of  the  wlwle  number  of  senators,  and  a  majority  of  the  whole 
number  shall  be  necessary  to  a  choice.  But  no  person  constitutionally 
ineligible  to  the  office  of  President  shall  be  eligible  to  that  of  Vice  Presi 
dent  of  the  United  States. 

i  Adopted  in  1798.  2  Adopted  in  1804. 

McM.  HIST.— 30.  15 


CONSTITUTION  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES 

ARTICLE   XIII1 

SECTION  1.  Neither  slavery  nor  involuntary  servitude,  except  as  a  pun 
ishment  for  crime  whereof  the  party  shall  have  been  duly  convicted,  shall 
exist  within  the  United  States,  or  any  place  subject  to  their  jurisdiction. 

SECTION  2.  Congress  shall  have  power  to  enforce  this  article  by  ap 
propriate  legislation. 

ARTICLE   XIV2 

SECTION  1.  All  persons  born  or  naturalized  in  the  United  States,  and 
subject  to  the  jurisdiction  thereof,  are  citizens  of  the  United  States  and  of 
the  State  wherein  they  reside.  No  State  shall  make  or  enforce  any  law 
which  shall  abridge  the  privileges  or  immunities  of  citizens  of  the  United 
States  ;  nor  shall  any  State  deprive  any  person  of  life,  liberty,  or  property, 
without  due  process  of  law  ;  nor  deny  to  any  person  within  its  jurisdic 
tion  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws. 

SECTION  2.  Representatives  shall  be  apportioned  among  the  several 
States  according  to  their  respective  numbers,  counting  the  whole  number 
of  persons  in  each  State,  excluding  Indians  not  taxed.  But  when  the  right 
to  vote  at  any  election  for  the  choice  of  electors  for  President  and  Vice 
President  of  the  United  States,  representatives  in  Congress,  the  executive 
and  judicial  officers  of  a  State,  or  the  members  of  the  legislature  thereof, 
is  denied  to  any  of  the  male  inhabitants  of  such  State,  being  twenty-one 
years  of  age,  and  citizens  of  the  United  States,  or  in  any  way  abridged, 
except  for  participation  in  rebellion,  or  other  crime,  the  basis  of  representa 
tion  therein  shall  be  reduced  in  the  proportion  which  the  number  of  such 
male  citizens  shall  bear  to  the  whole  number  of  male  citizens  twenty-one 
years  of  age  in  such  State. 

SECTION  3.  No  person  shall  be  a  senator  or  representative  in  Congress, 
or  elector  of  President  and  Vice  President,  or  hold  any  office,  civil  or  mili 
tary,  under  the  United  States,  or  under  any  State,  who,  having  previously 
taken  an  oath,  as  a  member  of  Congress,  or  as  an  officer  of  the  United 
States,  or  as  a  member  of  any  State  legislature,  or  as  an  executive  or  judi 
cial  officer  of  any  State,  to  support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States, 
shall  have  engaged  in  insurrection  or  rebellion  against  the  same,  or  given 
aid  or  comfort  to  the  enemies  thereof.  But  Congress  may  by  a  vote  of 
two  thirds  of  each  House,  remove  such  disability. 

SECTION  4.  The  validity  of  the  public  debt  of  the  United  States,  author 
ized  by  law,  including  debts  incurred  for  payment  of  pensions  and  bounties 
for  services  in  suppressing  insurrection  or  rebellion,  shall  not  be  questioned. 
But  neither  the  United  States  nor  any  State  shall  assume  or  pay  any  debt 
or  obligation  incurred  in  aid  of  insurrection  or  rebellion  against  the 
United  States,  or  any  claim  for  the  loss  or  emancipation  of  any  slave  ; 
but  all  such  debts,  obligations  and  claims  shall  be  held  illegal  and  void. 

SECTION  5.  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  enforce,  by  appropriate 
legislation,  the  provisions  of  this  article. 

ARTICLE   XV3 

SECTION  1.  The  right  of  citizens  of  the  United  States  to  vote  shall 
not  be  denied  or  abridged  by  the  United  States  or  by  any  State  on  account 
of  race,  color,  or  previous  condition  of  servitude. 

SECTION  2.  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  enforce  this  article  by 
appropriate  legislation. 

1  Adopted  in  1865.  2  Adopted  in  1868.  «  Adopted  in  1870. 

16 


STATE    CONSTITUTIONS 

We  have  seen  (page  155),  that  in  1776  the  Continental  Congress  advised 
the  people  of  the  colonies  to  form  governments  for  themselves,  and  that 
the  people  of  the  colonies  accordingly  adopted  constitutions  and  became 
sovereign  and  independent  states.  Of  the  thirteen  original  state  constitu 
tions,  none  save  that  of  Massachusetts  is  now  in  force,  and  even  that 
has  been  amended.  Changes  in  political  ideas,  changes  in  the  conditions 
of  life  due  to  the  wonderful  progress  of  our  country,  have  forced  the 
people  to  alter,  amend,  and  often  remake  their  state  constitutions. 

All  our  state  constitutions  now  in  force  divide  the  powers  of  govern 
ment  among  three  departments, — legislative,  executive,  and  judicial. 

The  Legislative  Department — called  in  some  states  the  Legislature, 
in  others  the  General  Assembly,  and  in  still  others  the  General  Court  — 
consists  in  every  state  of  two  branches  or  houses,  usually  known  as  the 
Senate  and  House  of  Representatives.  In  six  states  the  legislature  meets 
annually,  and  in  all  the  rest  biennially  ;  the  members  of  both  branches 
are  everywhere  elected  by  the  people,  and  serve  from  one  to  four  years. 
In  most  states  a  session  of  the  legislature  is  limited  to  a  period  of  from 
forty  to  ninety  days.  The  legislature  enacts  the  laws  (which  must  not 
conflict  with  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  the  treaties,  the  acts 
of  Congress,  or  the  constitution  of  the  state)  ;  but  the  powers  of  the  two 
houses  are  not  equal  in  all  the  states.  In  some  the  House  of  Represen 
tatives  has  the  sole  right  to  originate  bills  for  the  raising  and  the  expendi 
ture  of  money,  and  in  some  the  Senate  confirms  or  rejects  appointments 
to  office  made  by  the  Governor. 

The  Governor  is  the  executive  ;  is  elected  for  a  term  of  years  varying 
from  one  to  four ;  and  is  in  duty  bound  to  see  that  the  laws  are  enforced. 
To  him,  in  nearly  all  the  states,  are  sent  the  acts  of  the  legislature  to  be 
signed  if  he  approves,  or  vetoed  if  he  disapproves.  In  some  states  the 
Governor  may  veto  parts  or  items  of  an  act  and  approve  the  rest.  He 
is  commander  in  chief  of  the  militia ;  commissions  all  officers  whom  he 
appoints  ;  and  in  most  of  the  states  may  pardon  criminals. 

The  Judicial  Branch  of  government  is  composed  of  the  state  courts, 
whose  judges  are  appointed,  or  elected  for  a  long  term  of  years. 

These  three  branches  of  government  —  the  executive,  the  legislative, 
and  the  judicial  —  are  distinct  and  separate,  and  none  can  exercise  the 
powers  of  the  others.  No  judge  can  enact  a  law ;  no  legislature  can  try 
a  suit ;  no  executive  can  perform  the  duties  of  a  judge  or  a  legislature. 

When  the  thirteen  colonies  threw  off  their  allegiance  to  the  British 
Crown,  the  government  set  up  by  each  was  supreme  within  the  limits 
of  the  state.  Each  could  coin  money,  impose  duties  on  goods  imported 
from  abroad  or  from  other  states,  fix  the  legal  rate  of  -interest,  make  laws 
regulating  marriage  and  divorce  and  the  descent  of  property,  and  do  any 
thing  else  that  any  supreme  government  could  do. 

But  when  the  states  united  in  forming  a  strong  general  government 
by  adopting  the  Constitution,  they  did  not  give  up  all  their  powers  of 
government.  They  intrusted  part  of  them  to  the  Federal  government, 
and  retained  the  rest  as  before.  In  other  words,  the  people  of  each 
state,  instead  of  continuing  to  have  one  government,  adopted  a  double 

17 


STATE   CONSTITUTIONS 

government,  state  and  Federal,  according  to  the  plan  laid  down  in  the 
Constitution.  It  is  the  Federal  Constitution  that  makes  the  division  of 
powers  between  the  nation  and  the  separate  states.  The  Constitution, 
for  instance,  gives  the  Federal  government  the  powers  of  coining  money 
and  laying  import  duties,  and  forbids  these  powers  to  the  states  ;  but 
the  rate  of  interest,  marriage  and  divorce,  and  the  descent  of  property 
are  matters  not  mentioned  in  the  Constitution,  and  concerning  which  the 
states  retain  the  power  to  make  laws. 

In  many  cases  it  is  hard  to  decide  whether  a  state  has  power  to  do  a 
certain  thing.  Whenever  the  question  turns  on  the  interpretation  of  the 
Federal  Constitution,  it  is  decided  by  the  United  States  courts.  The 
Federal  Constitution  and  the  laws  and  treaties  made  in  accordance  with  it 
are  supreme  in  case  of  any  conflict  with  a  state  constitution  or  law. 

The  powers  of  government  exercised  by  the  states  are  more  numerous, 
and  affect  the  individual  citizen  in  more  ways,  than  those  of  the  nation. 
The  force  of  contracts  ;  the  relations  of  employer  and  employed,  husband 
and  wife,  parent  and  child  ;  the  administration  of  schools ;  and  the  pun 
ishment  of  most  crimes,  are  matters  controlled  by  the  state.  A  much 
larger  amount  of  taxes  is  imposed  by  the  states  than  by  the  nation. 

Local  Governments. — Moreover,  the  local  government  of  counties, 
towns,  and  cities  is  entirely  under  the  control  of  the  state.  State  con 
stitutions  contain  many  provisions  in  regard  to  this  local  government, 
but  the  legislature  can  make  laws  affecting  it  more  or  less  greatly  in 
the  various  states.  In  the  local  government  of  a  city,  town,  or  county 
there  is  to  some  extent  a  distribution  of  powers  among  legislative,  execu 
tive,  and  judicial  officers.  The  legislative  function  is  exercised  by  the 
city  council  or  board  of  aldermen,  the  town  trustees  (or  by  the  whole 
body  of  voters),  and  the  county  board  of  supervisors  or  commissioners ; 
the  executive,  by  the  city  mayor,  the  county  sheriff,  and  other  officers  ; 
and  the  judicial,  by  various  city  courts,  justices  of  the  peace,  and  county 
courts. 

Political  HigJits  and  Duties.  —  The  political  rights  and  duties  of  citizens 
depend  chiefly  on  the  state  constitutions  and  laws.  Elections,  both  state 
and  national,  are  conducted  by  state  officers.  The  state  prescribes  who 
shall  have  the  right  to  vote,  and  the  various  states  differ  greatly  in  this 
respect.  Congress  grants  citizenship  by  a  uniform  rule  of  naturalization  ; 
but  some  states  allow  aliens  to  vote  (on  certain  conditions),  and  some 
provide  that  a  naturalized  citizen  can  not  vote  until  a  certain  period  has 
elapsed  after  his  naturalization.  In  some  states  women  may  vote  ;  in  some 
only  those  men  who  have  certain  property  or  educational  qualifications. 

The  right  to  vote  is  the  qualification  for  holding  most  offices  ;  additional 
qualifications  are  prescribed  for  very  important  offices,  in  the  Federal  and 
state  constitutions.  Thus,  none  but  a  native  may  be  a  President  or  Vice 
President  of  the  United  States,  nor  may  a  citizen  under  thirty  years  of 
age  be  a  member  of  the  United  States  Senate.  Besides  voting  and  office 
holding,  the  most  important  political  rights  and  duties  of  citizens  are  to 
sit  on  juries  and  to  serve  in  the  army.  The  qualifications  of  jurors  in 
state  courts  are  prescribed  by  state  authority,  and  in  national  courts  by 
national  authority.  Congress  has  the  exclusive  power  to  raise  armies,  and 
in  the  Civil  War  hundreds  of  thousands  of  citizens  came  under  national 
authority  in  connection  with  the  duty  to  bear  arms.  The  militia,  how 
ever,  is  commanded  by  state  officers,  and  in  time  of  peace  is  under  the 
control  of  the  separate  states. 

18 


INDEX 


Abolition,  laws,  135,  429;  societies,  313; 
opposition  to,  336 ;  Compromise  Bill,  340  ; 
issue  of  Civil  War,  395. 

Acadia,  extent  of,  60;  struggle  for,  76- 
83. 

Act,  of  1870,  446,  448;  of  1873,  448;  of  1875, 
446,  448,  449,  471. 

Adams,  238. 

Adams,  Alvan,  369. 

Adams,  Charles  F.,  335. 

Adams,  John,  defends  soldiers,  119;  Decla 
ration  of  Independence,  132 ;  negotiates 
treat}',  149  ;  vice  president,  171 ;  president, 
209-2*15. 

Adams,  John  Quincy,  opposes  European 
colonization,  262-264 ;  presidential  nominee, 
277,  294  n.  1  ;  president,  297-301  ;  opposed 
to  slavery,  314. 

Adams,  John  Q.,  vice-pres.  nominee,  442. 

Adams,  Samuel,  149. 

Adams  Express  Company,  369. 

"  Adams  men,"  300,  301. 

"Administration  men,"  301. 

Alabama,  413,  450. 

Alabama,  admitted,  274 ;  secedes,  378 ;  re 
admitted,  431. 

Alabama  claims,  450. 

Alaska,  boundaries,  322.  487  ;  purchased,  451. 

Albany,  Dutch  at,  37  :  colonial  congress  at, 

Alexandria,  87,  99,  104. 

Algonquins,  60,  68,  70. 

Alien  and  Sedition  laws,  211,  212. 

Allegheny  River,  French  on,  81-84. 

Allen,  Ethan.  128. 

Allison  amendment,  449. 

Amendments  to  Constitution,  ten,  202 ; 
twelfth,  216 ;  proposed  thirteenth,  381  ; 
thirteenth,  429  ;  fourteenth,  430,  431  ;  fif 
teenth,  440,  442. 

America,  discovery  of,  11-14;  naming  of, 
14-17. 

American  Antislavery  Society,  313. 

American  Fur  Trading  Company,  331. 

American  party,  363. 

American  Republican  party,  353,  354;  dis 
appears,  355,  363. 

Amherst,  89. 

Amnesty,  proclamation  issued,  427 ;  politi 
cal  issue,  437,  439,  442. 

Anaesthesia  discovered,  373,  374 

Anderson,  Robert,  379,  382,  383,  426. 

Andre,  Major  John,  144. 


Annapolis,  Md.,  founded,  36 ;  riot  at,  116 ; 
trade  convention  at,  165. 

Annapolis,  Port  Royal  called,  79,  80. 

Annual  message,  21*6. 

Anti-Chinese  movement,  443,  444,  463-465. 

Anti-Federalists,  202,  203. 

Anti-Nebraska  men,  353. 

Antietam,  battle  of,  394.  395. 

Antimasonic  party,  300,  301,  306. 

Antislavery  movement,  312-315,  834,  343, 
347,350.  351. 

Appomattox  Courthouse,  406. 

Arbitration,  policj-,  450,  461 ;  between  Eng 
land  and  Venezuela,  474,  475. 

Argall,  Governor,  33. 

Argus,  237. 

Arizona,  territory,  334  n.  1,  436  ;  silver  inter 
ests,  472. 

Arkansas,  becomes  territory,  277  ;  admitted, 
366  ;  secedes,  386 ;  Confederates  in,  391  ; 
reconstruction,  428  ;  readmitted,  431. 

Army  of  the  Cumberland,  402 ;  disbanded, 
407. 

Army  of  the  Potomac,  peninsular  campaign, 
392-394  ;  at  Gettysburg,  396,  397  ;  in  Wil 
derness  campaign.  402,  404,  405,  406  ;  dis 
banded,  407. 

Army  of  Tennessee,  399. 

Army  of  Virginia,  394. 

Arnold,  Benedict,  attacks  Quebec,  131 ;  at 
Saratoga,  141 ;  treason  of,  144 ;  in  British 
service,  146. 

Articles  of  Confederation,  155,  158,  159,  163, 
167,  168,  204. 

Ashburton,  Lord,  317. 

Assumption  of  state  debts,  201. 

Astor,  John  Jacob,  221. 

Astoria  founded,  221. 

Atchison  settled,  350,  351  n.  1. 

Atlanta  burned,  402. 

Atlantic  cable,  374,  375,  459. 

Auburn  settled,  267. 

Aurania  settled,  433. 

Austin,  Moses,  320. 

Austin,  Stephen,  320. 

B 

Bahama  Islands,  13. 

Balboa,  17,  19. 

Baltimore,  founded,  36  ;   in   colonial  times, 

99  ;  Congress  at,  137  ;  attacked,  238  ;  route 

to    the   West,   285 ;    convention    at,   361  ; 

insurgents    in,    387 ;    labor    congress    in, 

443. 


19 


INDEX 


Baltimore,  Lord,  84,  85,  86. 

Banks,  United  States,  see  National  Bank  ; 
state,  see  State  Banks. 

Banks,  N.  P.,  presidential  nominee,  354;  in 
Civil  War,  392,  394. 

Bannock  City  founded,  436. 

Barre,  116. 

Barron,  Commander,  227. 

Baton  Rouge,  captured,  150,  392  n.  1 ;  Span 
iards  claim,  152. 

"  Battle  above  the  Clouds,"  399. 

Bean,  William,  191. 

Bear  State  republic,  332,  333. 

Beauregard,  General,  382,  383,  388. 

Bell,  John,  363. 

Belmont,  286,  287. 

Belpre  settled,  194. 

Bemis  Heights,  battle  of,  141. 

Bennington,  battle  of,  139,  140. 

Benton,  Thomas  H.,  senator,  294  n.  1,  308, 
329,  332. 

Bents  Fort,  329. 

Berceau,  213. 

Berkeley,  Lord,  55. 

Berlin  Decree,  225,  229,  230. 

Bidwell,  John,  470. 

Bienville,  Celoron  de,  81-88. 

Big  Bottom  massacre,  242. 

Bills  of  credit,  199,200. 

Biloxi  settled,  79. 

Bimetallism,  254,  472. 

Birney,  James  Gillespie,  presidential  nomi 
nee,  312,  315,  324;  abolitionist,  313,  314. 

Black,  James,  444. 

Black  Rock  burned,  235. 

Bladensburg,  battle  of,  238. 

Elaine,  James  G.,  465. 

Blair,  Francis  P.,  439. 

Bland-Allison  Silver  Bill,  448,  449,  467. 

Blockade,  of  1814,  237-239;  Southern,  411, 
412. 

Blockade  runners,  411,  412. 

Blue  Lodges,  851.' 

Bonded  debt,  of  1866,  437;  of  1894,  473. 

Bonds,  United  States,  420,  438,  439,  448,  461, 
466,  471,  473. 

Bonhomme  Richard,  148,  149. 

Bonneville,  Captain,  331. 

Boom  towns,  458. 

Boone   Daniel,  191. 

Boonesboro  settled,  191. 

Booth,  John  Wilkes,  assassinates  Lincoln, 
426.  427. 

Bordentown,  279. 

Border  states  secede,  386,  387. 

Boscawen,  89. 

Boston,  213,  473. 

Boston,  founded,  47;  in  colonial  times,  99; 
riot,  116;  massacre,  118,  119;  tea  partv, 
120;  Port  Bill,  120,  121  ;  occupied  by  Brit 
ish,  127-131 ;  evacuated,  131 ;  in  1790,  178  ; 
fire,  445. 

Boston  Neck,  126. 

Boston  Sentinel,  260. 

Boundary,  of  United  States  in  1783  150  151  • 
in  1815,  241;  Canadian,  261,  316,  450; 
Spanish,  261  ;  of  Alaska,  322, 487  ;  of  Texas, 
326,  329,  340,  341  ;  map  showing  territorial 
growth  of  United  States,  452,  453. 


Boa-er,  237. 

Braddock,  Edward,  87,  88. 

Bradford,  William,  41,  44  n.  1. 

Bradstreet,  89. 

Bragg,  390,  391,  399. 

Brandywine,  battle  of,  138. 

Brazil  discovered,  16. 

Breckinridge,  John  C.,  vice  president,  855; 
presidential  candidate,  361. 

Breeds  Hill,  battle  of,  129,  130. 

Brewster,  William,  41. 

British,  see  English. 

British  Columbia,  boundary  of,  450. 

British  Guiana,  474. 

Brown,  B.  Gratz.  442. 

Brown,  Jacob,  235. 

Brown,  John,  359. 

Brown,  Robert,  40. 

Brownists,  40^6,  48. 

Brush,  459. 

Bryan,  William  J.,  475,  476,  485. 

Buchanan,  James,  president,  355-363;  atti 
tude  toward  seceded  states,  378,  379. 

Buckner,  General  Simon  B.,  389,  475. 

Buell,  General,  390,  391. 

Buena  Vista,  battle  of,  328. 

Buffalo  burned,  235. 

Bull  Run,  battles  of,  387,  388,  394. 

Bunker  Hill,  battle  of,  129,  130. 

Bunker  Hill  Monument,  131. 

Burgoyne,  John,  139,  141. 

Burke,  P.  B.,  369. 

Burlingame,  Anson,  444. 

Burnside,  General,  394,  396. 

Burr,  Aaron,  215. 

Business  depression  of  '93,  472,  473. 

Butler,  143. 

Butler,  A.  P.,  336. 

Butler,  Benjamin  F.,  392,  465. 

Butler,  William  O.,  335. 

Butterfield  overland  stage,  434. 


Cabinet,  first,  198. 

Cable,  Atlantic,  374,  375,  459. 

Cabots,  14. 

Cabral,  14,  16. 

Calhoun,  John  C.,  in  War  Congress,  231,  294 
n.  1  ;  vice  president,  297,  298  ;  favors  nulli 
fication,  303, 305  ;  on  slavery,  335  ;  on  Com 
promise  Bill,  340;  death  of.  341. 

California,  Fremont  in,  329-333;  independ 
ent,  332,  333  ;  slavery  in,  334 ;  gold  dis 
coveries,  336-338;  applies  for  admission, 
338,  340,  341  ;  settled  and  admitted,  368 : 
Pacific  Railroad  to,  434,  435. 

Calverts,  34,  35,  36. 

Cambridge  settled,  47. 

Camden,  battle  of,  144. 

Canada,  ceded  to  British,  91 ;  boundary  of, 
261,  316,  450  :  fisheries,  450,  451. 

Canals,  251,  2S2-285,  366,  435. 

Canonchet,  72. 

Can  so  attacked,  80. 

Cape  Ann  colony,  46. 

Cape  Breton,  91. 

Cape  Cod  named,  29. 

Cape  Fear  River  settlements,  54. 


20 


INDEX 


Captains  of  industry,  460. 

Caribbean  Islands,  14  n.  1. 

Carle  ton,  Sir  Guy,  131. 

Carolinas,  settled,  54,  55,  57 ;  see  North  and 
South  Carolina. 

Carpetbaggers,  440. 

Carson,  Kit,  332. 

Carteret,  Sir  George,  55. 

Cartier,  Jacques,  60. 

Cass,  Lewis,  335. 

Castine  massacre,  77. 

Castle  Pinckney,  379. 

Catholics  in  Maryland,  34-36. 

Cayuga  Indians,  68. 

Cedar  Creek,  battle  of,  405. 

Cedar  Mountain,  battle  of,  394. 

Celoron  de  Bienville,  81-83. 

Census,  fifst,  176 ;  of  1810,  246  ;  of  1870,  436  ; 
of  1900,  484. 

Central  Pacific  Railroad,  435. 

Cerro  Gordo,  battle  of,  328. 

Certificates,  national,  200. 

Chadds  Ford,  battle  of,  138. 

Chambers,  B.  J.,  462. 

Chambersburg  burned,  404. 

Cham  plain,  60,  70. 

Chancellorsville,  battle  of,  396. 

Chapultepec,  battle  of,  328. 

Charles  I.,  grants  Maryland,  34,  35 ;  perse 
cutes  Puritans,  47  ;  beheaded,  107. 

Charles  II.,  grants  Connecticut,  52 ;  grants 
Carolina,  54,  55,  57 ;  grants  Pennsylvania, 
56. 

Charleston,  founded,  54 ;  attacked,  58 ;  in 
colonial  times,  99,  105;  opposes  tea  tax, 
120 ;  captured.  143,  144,  426  ;  nominating 
convention,  360. 

Charleston  harbor,  379. 

Charlestown,  settled,  47. 

Charlestown  Neck,  128. 

Charter  colonies,  105,  106. 

Charters,  of  1606,  29,  30;  of  1609,  32-34;  of 
1629,  46. 

Chase,  Salmon  P.,  347. 

Chattanooga,  battle  of,  398,  399. 

Cherokee  Indians,  68,  242. 

Cherry  Creek,  433. 

Cherry  Valley  massacre,  143. 

Chempeake,  227,  237. 

Chesapeake  and  Delaware  Canal,  251. 

Chester,  138. 

Chicago,  Republican  conventions,  363,  462  ; 
in  1832,  365;  in  1840,  365;  labor  congress, 
443;  convention  of '69,  444;  fire,  445;  meat 
packing,  455  ;  Bimetallic  League,  472. 

Chickahominy  River,  393. 

Chickamauga,  battle  of,  398,  399. 

Chickasaw  Indians,  68. 

China,  disorder  in,  484. 

Chinese  Exclusion  acts,  464,  465. 

Chinese  immigration,  443,  444,  447,  464,  470. 

Chippewa,  battle  of.  235. 

Choctaw  Indians,  68. 

Church  of  New  England,  48. 

Churubusco,  battle  of,  328. 

Cincinnati,  in  1802,  194;  in  1810,  245;  con 
vention  of  1872,  442  ;  labor  congress,  443  ; 
convention  of  1876,  447. 

Circuit  courts,  197,  198. 


Civil  Rights  Bill,  430. 

Civil  service  reform,  442,  446,  44T,  461,  462, 
464. 

Civil  War,  378-418  ;  cost  of,  419-424 ;  results 
of,  454. 

Clark,  General  George  Rogers,  143,  160. 

Clark,  William,  219,  881. 

Clay,  Henry,  speaker,  231,  294  n.  1  ;  presi 
dential  nominee,  297,  324;  secretary  of 
state,  300  ;  Compromise  Tariff,  305  ;  Infant 
School,  307 ;  Compromise  Bill,  339-341 ; 
death  of,  352  n.  1. 

Clermont,  253. 

Cleveland,  population  in  1840,  366. 

Cleveland,  Stephen  Grover,  president,  465, 
466,  470-475. 

Clinton,  George,  229,  316  n.  2. 

Clinton,  Governor  De  Witt,  282,  283,  294. 

Clinton,  Sir  Henry,  campaigns,  142,  143,  144, 
146. 

Cobb,  Howell,  380. 

Cochrane,  General  John,  425,  426. 

Cockburn,  Admiral,  238. 

Cohoes  founded,  290. 

Coin  at  a  premium,  438. 

Coinage  of  gold  and  silver,  254,  467,  469,  470. 

Cold  Harbor,  battle  of,  404. 

Colfax,  Schuyler,  439. 

Collins  steamship  line,  374. 

Colonial,  life,  93-108  ;  forms  of  government, 
105-108,  118,  122, 155. 

Colonies,  Spanish.  23,  24  ;  English,  25-39,  40- 
58  ;  Dutch,  37-39  ;  Swedish,  38,  39. 

Colorado,  acquired,  334  n.  1 ;  a  territory,  436 ; 
admitted,  447,  457  n.  1 ;  silver  interests, 
472,  475. 

Colt,  290. 

Columbia  Centinel,  295. 

Columbia  River  discovered,  219,  220. 

Columbus,  Christopher,  11-14. 

Columbus,  Ky.,  evacuated,  389, 

Columbus,  O.,  population  in  1840,  366 ;  con 
ventions,  443,  444. 

Commerce,  in  colonial  times,  101-103;  about 
1810,  248,  249;  destroyers,  412-414.  See 
also  Trade. 

Committee  of  Safety,  126. 

Compromise,  Missouri,  276  ;  tariff,  305 :  of 
1850,  339,  340,  341,  342,  346,  347  n.  2,  352; 
of  Crittenden,  380,  381. 

Compromises  in  Constitution,  167,  1C8. 

Comptroller  of  the  currency,  421. 

Concord,  battle  of,  l->7,  \-^. 

Confederate  cruisers,  413,  414,  418,  449,  450. 

Confederate  States,  formed,  378  ;  during  civil 
war,  378-406 :  capital  of,  386 ;  end  of,  406, 
407;  military  supplies  of,  411  ;  debts  and 
losses  of,  422-424  ;  congress  dissolved,  428. 

Congress,  415,  416. 

Congress,  under  Articles  of  Confederation, 
159,  and  see  Continental  Congress  ;  recon 
struction  plan  of,  430,  4:51  ;  gives  land 
grants,  435  ;  acts  of  1862  and  18G3,  438. 

Congress,  National  Labor,  443. 

Connecticut,  settled,  50-53  ;  in  colonial  times, 
101,  102;  Reserve,  160. 

Conscription,  Confederate,  423,  424. 

Constellation,  213. 

Constitution,  236,  23T. 


INDEX 


Constitution  of  U.  9.,  165,  166,  168,  1(59,  170, 

176  n.  1  ;  amendments  to,  see  Amendments. 

Printed  in  Appendix,  pp.  5-16. 
Constitutional  Union  party,  363. 
Continental  army,  129. 
Continental  Congress,  121,  122,  128,  129,  155, 

158,  168,   164,  165,  166,  169,  170,  198,  202, 

254,  274. 

Continental  debt,  197,  198,  199,  202. 
Continental  money,  199,  200, 246. 
Contract  labor,  464. 
Contraction  policy,  438. 
Contreras,  battle  of,  328. 
Conway  cabal,  141. 
Cooper.  Peter,  447. 
Corinth,  389,  390;   battle  of,  391. 
•Cornwallis,  Lord,  136,  137,  144,  146. 
Coronado,  21,  22. 
Corporations,  rise  of,  459,  460  ;  opposition  to, 

461,  464,  465,  470. 
Cortereal,  14. 
Cortes,  19,  20. 
Cotton  gin,  195,  248. 
Cotton  industry,  194-196,  411,  454. 
Cotton-seed  oil,  455. 
Council  Bluffs,  Mormons  at,  292. 
Council  for  New  England,  44,  46,  47. 
Coureurs  de  bois,  70,  71,  78. 
Court  of  Admiralty,  225. 
Courts  of  U.  S.  established,  197,  198. 
Cowpens,  battle  of,  145,  146. 
Cranfill,  J.  B.,  470. 
Crawford,  William  H.,  295,  297,  300. 
Credit  Strengthening  Act,  448. 
.Creek  Indians,  68,  260,  261. 
'Crittenden's  Compromise,  380,  381. 
Croghan,  Major,  234. 

Crown  Point,  founded,  80 ;  English  at,  88,  90. 
Cuba,  361,476-484. 
Culpep'er  Courthouse,  404. 
Cumberland,  415,  416. 
Cumberland  Road,  252. 
Cunard  steamship  line,  374. 
Currency,  U.  S.,  253,  254,  420,  421,  445,  446, 

461,  470,  472. 

Curtis,  Gen.  S.  R.,  389,  391. 
Customs  Commissioners,  117. 


Dakota  Territory,  formed,  436 ;    population 

of,  456. 

Dallas,  George  Mifflin,  322,  324. 
Dalton,  battle  of,  399,  402. 
Daniel,  William,  465. 
Davenport,  John,  51. 
Davie,  William  R.,  214. 
Davis,  David,  443. 
Davis,  Jefferson,  president  of  Confederacy, 

378,  379,  880,  402,  404  ;  capture  of,  407,  428. 
Dayton,  William  L.,  355. 
De  Soto,  22. 
Deane,  Silas,  147,  148. 
Dearborn's  expedition,  233. 
Debt,  national,  after  the  Revolutionary  War 

198,  199;  in  1790,  200,  246;  in  1801,  309; 

in  1835,  310;  new  national,  811,  312;  dur 


ing  Civil  War,  419,  420,  421,  422  ;  in  1866, 

437-439  ;  in  1887,  461,  466 ;  in  1894,  473. 
Declaration  of  Independence,  132,  134,  135; 

in  Vermont,  243.     See  Appendix,  pp.  1-4 
Declaration  of  Rights,  115,  121.  122. 
DeKalb,  149. 
Delaware,  claims  in,  38,  39;  sold  to  Penn,  56 

57  ;  in  colonial  times,  101,  102, 103 ;  slaver* 

in,  429. 

Delaware,  Lord,  32. 
Delaware  Indians,  68,  72. 
Delegates,  territorial,  162,  351  n.  2. 
Democratic  party,  203,  260,  306,  311,  315-317, 

322,  324,  335.  346,  352.  353,  356,  357,  360. 

361,  426,  435,  439,  442;  446,  447,  462,  465, 

466,  470,  475,  485. 
Democratic  Republicans,  300,  306. 
Denver,  settled,  433,  434, 435 ;  convention  at 

472. 

Department  of  Labor  established.  465. 
Detroit,  settled,  80,  191 ;  surrender  of,  233. 
Dewey,  Commodore,  478. 
Dingley  Tariff,  476. 
Dinwiddie,  Governor  Robert,  83-35. 
Direct  tax,  214. 
District  courts,  197, 198. 
District  of  Columbia,  215;   slavery  in,  314 

336,  339,  340,  341. 
Dixon,  Jeremiah,  56  n.  1. 
Dole,  president  of  Hawaiian  Republic,  474. 
Donelson,  Andrew  Jackson,  354. 
Donelson,  John,  191. 
Dorchester  settled,  47,  50. 
Dorchester  Heights  captured,  131. 
Douglas,    Stephen   A.,   Nebraska   Bill,  347; 

debates  with  Lincoln,  358,  359 ;    elected 

senator,  359  ;  presidential  nominee,  361. 
Dover  riot,  116. 
Dow,  Neal,  462. 
Drake,  148. 

Drake,  Sir  Francis,  26,  27. 
Draper,  Dr.  John  W.,  373. 
Dred  Scott  decision,  355,  356,  357,  359,  360 

363. 

Duane,  William  J.,  307  n.  3. 
Duluth  founded,  456. 
Duquesne,  Marquis,  84. 
Durham  massacre,  77. 

Dutch,  possessions,  9,  55 ;  settlements,  36-39. 
Dutch  West  India  Company,  37-39. 


I 


Earle,  Thomas,  312,  315. 

Early,  Jubal,  404,  405. 

East  India  Company,  119. 

East  Indies,  trade  with,  9-11. 

Eastern  Colonies,  occupations,  etc.,  101,  102. 

Kastport  captured,  237. 

Edmunds  Law,  464. 

Electoral  college,  170,  171,  209,  210,  258,  301, 

439,  463. 

Electoral  commission,  447,  448. 
Electricity,  94,  459. 
Elizabeth,  Queen,  27,  40. 
Eli/.abeth  City  captured,  418. 
Ellmaker,  Amos,  306. 
Ellsworth,  Oliver,  214. 


22 


INDEX 


Emancipation,  agitation,  313,  314;  Proclama 
tion,  394-896,  429  ;  cost  of,  424. 

Embargo  laws,  228,  229,  249. 

Emigration,  western,  241.  242,  266-277,  433, 
434. 

Endicott,  John,  46,  49. 

English,  possessions,  9,  91 ;  settlements,  25- 
39,  40-58;  relations  with  France,  76-91; 
relations  with  Indians,  70,  71  ;  government 
of  colonies,  105-108;  attitude  to  colonies, 
110-122;  war  with  colonies,  126-152;  at 
war  with  French,  206,  224-231  ;  disputed 
right  of  trade,  208;  favor  South  American 
republics,  264;  favor  South,  411-414,  449, 
450;  Venezuelan  boundary  question,  474. 

English,  William  H.,  462. 

English  fur  companies,  323. 

Enterprise,  213,  237. 

Era  of  Good  Feeling,  260. 

Ericsson,  Captain  John,  415. 

Ericsson,  Leif,  11. 

Erie  Canal,  282-285. 

Erie  Indians,  68. 

Essex,  237. 

Europe,  claims  in  America,  9,  262-265;  atti 
tude  during  Civil  War,  383,  395,  449,  450. 

Evans,  Oliver,  253. 

Everett,  Edward,  363. 

Exeter  massacre,  77. 

Explorations,  European,  9-24 ;  French,  60- 
65;  Western,  219-221  ;  Northwestern,  329, 
331,  332,  333. 

Express,  pony,  434. 

Express  companies  formed,  369. 


Fair  Oaks,  battle  of,  393. 

Fairbanks,  289. 

Falmouth  burned,  147. 

Farewell  Address,  Washington's,  209. 

Farmers'  Alliance,  468,  469. 

Farragut,  Admiral,  391,  392,  418. 

Federal  Hall,  171.  173. 

Federal  money,  254,  255. 

Federalist  party,  170,  202-218,  229,  259,  260, 
295,  296. 

Ferdinand,  King,  aids  Columbus,  13. 

Field,  Cyrus  W.,  374,  375. 

Field,  James  GK,  469. 

Fifteenth  Amendment,  440.  442. 

"  Fifty-four  forty  or  fight,"  324. 

Fillmore,  Millard,  vice  president,  335 ;  presi 
dent,  341-343;  presidential  nominee,  354. 
355. 

Financial,  distress  of  '37,  310.  311  ;  condition 
after  Civil  War,  437-439  ;  policy,  Grant's, 
448 ;  questions  after  '88,  46fi-469. 

First  Continental  Congress,  121,  122. 

Fiscal  Bank  of  United  States,  316. 

Fiscal  Corporation,  316. 

Fishery  question,  450,  451. 

Fitch,  John,  190,  252. 

Five  Nations,  or  Iroquois  Indians,  68,  72, 
143  n.  2. 

Flag,  national,  140  ;  American  naval,  147. 

Flamborough  Head,  148. 

Florida,  413,  450. 


Florida,  discovered,  17 ;  a  British  possession, 
91;  East  and  West,  110;  a  Spanish  pos 
session,  151,  152;  purchased,  201  ;  a  terri 
tory,  278, 366  ;  admitted,  366 ;  secedes,  378 ; 
readmitted,  431. 

Foote,  Flag  Officer,  3SS,  3S9,  391. 

Force  Act,  of  1809,  228  ;  Jackson's,  304,  305 ; 
of  1871,  442. 

Foreign  labor,  464. 

Foreigners,  see  Immigration. 

Fort  Assumption  built,  80. 

Fort  Boise,  436. 

Fort  Chartres  built,  SO. 

Fort  Crevecoeur  built,  64. 

Fort  Cumberland,  88. 

Fort  Donelson  captured,  388,  389. 

Fort  Duquesne  built,  85;  87,  88;  captured,  89. 

Fort  Edward,  139. 

Fort  Erie  captured,  235. 

Fort  Fisher  captured,  418. 

Fort  Frontenac  captured,  89. 

Fort  Hall  founded,  331. 

Fort  Henry  captured,  388. 

Fort  Le  Boeuf  built,  83  ;  84,  85. 

Fort  Leavenworth,  329. 

Fort  Lee  attacked,  135. 

Fort  Loyal  massacre,  77. 

Fort  McAllister  captured,  403. 

Fort  McHenry  bombarded,  238. 

Fort  Macon  captured,  418. 

Fort  Meigs,  battle  of,  234. 

Fort  Monroe,  403. 

Fort  Morgan,  418. 

Fort  Moultrie,  379. 

Fort  Nassau  built,  37,  38. 

Fort  Natchitoches,  80. 

Fort  Necessity  built,  86. 

Fort  Orange  built,  37. 

Fort  Pillow  captured,  389. 

Fort  Pitt,  89. 

Fort  Rosalie  founded,  80. 

Fort  St.  Louis  built,  64,  65,  76. 

Fort  Stanwix  besieged,  140,  141. 

Fort  Stephenson,  battle  of,  234. 

Fort  Sumter,  379  ;  battles  of,  382,  383,  418. 

Fort  Ticonderoga.  89.  90,  128,  139. 

Fort  Tombeckbee  built,  80. 

Fort  Toulouse  founded,  80. 

Fort  Venango  built,  S3. 

Fort  Washington  captured,  135. 

"  Forty-niners,"  338. 

Fourteenth  Amendment,  430,  431. 

Fractional  currency,  420,  421,  437,  446. 

Franchise  right,  182,  294 ;  interference  with, 
441,  442. 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  during  the  French  War, 
85,  86,  87; 'experiments.  94,  95;  Declara 
tion  of  Independence,  132  ;  ambassador  to 
France,  142,  147,  148, 149. 

Franklin,  state  of,  192. 

Fray  Marcos,  21. 

Fredericksburg,  in  colonial  times,  104 ;  bat 
tle  of.  394. 

Free  coinage,  of  gold  and  silver.  254,  475 ;  of 

silver.  449.  467,  469,  472,  473,  475. 
Free-soil  party,  334,  335,  339,  340,  346,  347  ; 

joins  Republicans,  355. 

Freedmen,  treatment  after  war,  429,  430 ; 
vote,  439-142,  445. 


23 


INDEX 


Freedmen's  Bureau  Bill,  430. 

Frelinghuysen,  Theodore,  324. 

Fremont,   John   C.,   in  California, 
presidential    nominee,   355,   425,   426;    in 
Shenandoah  valley,  392. 

French,  possessions,  9;  explorations,  60-65 ; 
relations  with  Indians,  70  ;  relations  with 
English,  76-91 ;  and  Indian  War,  86-91  ; 
abandon  America,  90,  91 ;  acknowledge 
our  independence,  141,  142 ;  republic  es 
tablished,  206 ;  war  with  English,  206,  224- 
231 ;  trouble  with  United  States,  210-214 ; 
during  Civil  War,  449, 450  ;  in  Mexico,  450. 

French  Directory,  210,  214. 

Frenchtowu,  battle  of,  233,  234. 

Fries's  Rebellion,  214. 

Frobisher,  Sir  Martin,  26. 

Frolic,  236,  237. 

Frontenac,  Count,  77,  78. 

Frontier  life,  268-273. 

Frye,  Joshua,  85. 

Fugitive-slave  laws,  336,  339,  340,  341,  342, 
346,  353,  355. 

Fulton,  Robert,  253. 

Fundamental  Orders  of  Connecticut,  50. 

Funding  of  national  debt,  201. 

Fusion  tickets,  354. 


Q 


Gadsden,  James,  334. 

Gadsden  Purchase,  334. 

"  Gag  Rule,"  314,  315. 

Gage,  General  Thomas,  126,  127,  129. 

Gaines  Mill,  battle  of,  394. 

Gallatin,  Albert,  203,  251,  252. 

Galli polls  settled,  194. 

Gallissoniere,  Ma 

Gama,  Vasco  da,  14. 

Garfleld,  James,  president,  462,  463 ;  death 
•  of,  463. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  313. 

Gates,  General  Horatio,  141,  144. 

Gates,  Sir  Thomas,  32. 

Genet,  206. 

Geneva  awards,  450. 

George  II.  grants  charter,  57. 

Georgia,  settled,  57,  58;  in  colonial  times, 
101,  103-105;  annexed  territory,  110;  con 
quered,  143  ;  cedes  land  to  Congress,  162  n., 
246;  secedes,  378;  Sherman's  inarch 
through,  399,  402,  403  ;  again  in  the  Union, 
445. 

Germantown,  battle  of,  139. 

Gerry,  Elbridge,  210,  295,  316  n.  2. 

Gerrymander,  295,  296. 

Gettysburg,  battle  of,  396,  397,  399. 

Gettysburg  Address,  Lincoln's,  397. 

Gila  River,  334. 

Gilbert,  Sir  Humphrey,  27. 

Goffe,  William,  52  n.  2. 

Gold,  discovered  in  California,  337,  338;  at 
Pikes  Peak,  433 ;  in  Northwestern  States, 
456;  payments  suspended,  421 ;  sole  legal 
tender,  448,  449  ;  standard,  485. 

Gold  Democrats,  475. 

Gold  reserve,  471,  472,  473. 

Goldsboro,  404, 


Goodyear,  873. 

Gorges,  Sir  Ferdinando,  40,  47,  48. 

Gosnold,  29. 

Gourgues,  24. 

Government,  colonial,  105-108  ;  under  Arti 
cles  of  Confederation,  159  ;  of  territories, 
161,  162;  control  of  railroads,  etc.,  461, 
464,  469,  476. 

Grant,  General  U.  S.,  in  Civil  War,  388-392, 
397-399,  402-406  ;  relations  with  Johnson, 
430,  431 ;  president,  439^48 ;  third  term 
proposed,  462. 

Gray,  Captain,  220. 

Great  American  Desert,  329,  331,  332,  486, 
457. 

Great  Britain,  see  English. 

Great  Lakes  explored,  60,  61. 

Great  Salt  Lake,  292,  332. 

Great  Western,  374. 

Greeley,  Horace,  442,.  444. 

Green  Mountain  Boys,  128,  243. 

Greenback  party,  438,  439,  447,  462,  465. 

Greenbacks,  420,  437,  438,  439,  445,  448,  471. 

Greene,  Nathanael,  146. 

Grenville,  Prime  Minister,  113. 

Groesbeck,  W.  S.,  442. 

Groton  massacre,  77. 

Guadalupe  Hidalgo,  treaty  of,  333. 

Guerriere,  230,  236. 

Guilford  founded,  51. 

Guilford  Courthouse,  battle  of,  146. 

Guinther,  248. 

Guthrie,  458. 

H 

Hail,  Columbia  !  written,  211. 

Hale,  John  P.,  346. 

Hale,  Nathan,  149. 

Half-Moon,  36. 

Halieck,  General  Henry,  388,  389,  390,  394. 

Hamet,  342. 

Hamilton,  Alexander,  198. 

Hamlin,  Hannibal,  363,  381. 

Hampton  Roads,  peace  conference  at,  405; 

Confederate  cruiser  sunk  in,  413;  Monitor 

and  Merrinuic,  415-417. 
Hancock,  General  Winlield,  462. 
Hand  loom.  9!). 
Hand  mill,  272. 
Hand  press,  180. 
Hard  cider  campaign,  315,  316. 
Hard  times  of  '73,  445,  446 ;  of  '93,  472,  473. 
Harnden,  W.  F.,  369. 
Harpers  Ferry,  359,  360. 
Harrisburg  convention,  303. 
Harrison,  Benjamin,  president,  466-470. 
Harrison,  William   Henry,  in  War  of  1812, 

233,  234,  235 ;   delegate  in  Congress,  245 ; 

at  Tippecanoe,  246;  presidential  candidate, 

311,  312,  315;  elected,  316;  death  of,  316. 
Harrisons  Landing,  394. 
Harrodsburg  settled,  191. 
Hartford  settled,  50. 
Hatteras  Inlet,  417. 
Haverhill  massacre,  77. 
Hawaiian  annexation,  473,  474,  481. 
Hayes,  Rutherford  B.,  president,  447-449. 
Havne,  Governor,  303,  304. 
Helena  founded,  436. 


INDEX 


Hendricks,  Thomas  A.,  44T,  465. 

Hennepin,  219. 

Henry,  Patrick,  114. 

Hessians,  182,  137. 

Highways  of  trade,  279-289. 

Hispaniola  colonized,  18. 

Hobart,  Garret  A.,  475. 

Hoe  octuple  press,  180. 

Holly  Springs,  391. 

Holy  Alliance,  262-265. 

Home  manufactures  defended,  296,  297. 

Homestead  Law,  363,  439. 

Hood,  General  J.  B.,  402,  404. 

Hooker,  General,  396,  399. 

Hooker,  Thomas,  50. 

Hopkinson,  Joseph,  211. 

Hornet,  237. 

House  of  Burgesses,  33,  114. 

House  of  Commons,  115. 

House  of  Lords,  115. 

House    of    Eepresentatives,    formed,    167 ; 

elects  president,  216,  297. 
Houston,  Samuel,  321. 
Howe,  Elias.  371 . 
Howe,  General  William,  130,  131,  135,  137- 

139,  140,  141. 
Hudson,  Henry,  36,  37. 
Hudson  Bay  Company,  486. 
Hull's  surrender,  233. 
Hunt,  Walter,  289,  371. 
Huron  Indians,  60,  68,  70. 
Hutchinson,  Anne,  50. 


Iberville,  79. 

Idaho,  a  territory.  436 ;  admitted,  456,  457  ; 
silver  interests,  472,  475. 

Idaho  City  founded,  436. 

Illinois,  a' territory,  246 ;  admitted,  274. 

Immigration,  Chinese,  see  Chinese ;  Euro 
pean,  353,  354,  368,  439,  460,469  ;  Western, 
see  Emigration. 

Impeachment  of  Johnson,  431. 

Impressment  of  sailors,  208,  225,  239. 

Income  tax,  469,  476. 

Indented  servants,  97,  98,  105. 

Independence  Chamber,  166. 

Independence,  Declaration  of,  132,  134,  135. 

Independence  Hall,  134,  135. 

Independent  National  party,  447. 

Independent  Treasury  law,  311,  312,  316. 

Independents  or  Mugwumps,  465. 

India  rubber,  373. 

Indian  country,  110,  150. 

Indiana,  a  territory,  245 ;  admitted,  274. 

Indiana  Register,  267. 

Indianapolis,  population  in  1840,  365. 

Indians,  alliance  with  French,  60,  61,  62; 
traits  of,  66-73;  wars,  71-73;  in  French 
and  Indian  War,  77-79,  85-89  ;  during  Rev 
olution,  142,  143;  in  1790,  193;  in  1812, 
234,  239 ;  troubles  with,  242,  243,  246,  260, 
261,  274 ;  in  Oregon,  322,  323 ;  territory 
sold,  458. 

Industrial  revolution,  266-277,  301,  302,  454- 
461. 

Inflation  Bill,  445. 

Inswgente,  213. 


Interest  indents,  199. 

Internal  improvements,  political  issue,  296, 

297,  303,  307. 

Internal  revenue  system,  419,  420. 
Interstate  Commerce  Bill,  464,  465. 
Intolerable  Acts,  120,  121,  122. 
Inventions  about  1860,370-374;  about  1880, 

459. 

"  Invisible  Empire,"  440. 
Iowa,  a  territory,  366;  admitted,  366. 
Ironclads,  414,  415. 

Iroquois  Indians,  60,  68,  70,  72,  77,  143. 
Irwinsville,  407. 

Isabella,  Queen,  aids  Columbus,  13. 
Island  No.  10  captured,  389. 
luka,  battle  of,  391. 


Jackson,  convention  at,  354 ;  battle  of,  398. 

Jackson,  Dr.,  373,  374. 

Jackson,  General  Andrew,  iit  New  Orleans, 
239  ;  defeats  Indians,  261,  274  ;  presidential 
nominee,  294  n.  1,  297  ;  president,  301-311. 

Jackson,  General  T.  J.,  393. 

"Jackson  men."  300,  301. 

Jalapa,  battle  of,  328. 

Jamaica  discovered,  14  n.  1. 

James  I.,  creates  Virginia  Company,  29,  30; 
annuls  charter,  36. 

Jamestown  settled,  30,  81,  104. 

Java  captured,  237. 

Jay,  John,  treaty  of  Paris,  149 ;  ambassador 
to  London,  209. 

Jay  Cooke  and  Co.'s  failure,  445. 

Jefferson,  Thomas,  writes  Declaration  of  In 
dependence,  132,  134 ;  secretary  of  state, 
198;  Republican  leader,  203;  vice  president, 
210  ;  opposes  Alien  and  Sedition  laws,  212 ; 
president,  215-229  ;  favors  political  pro 
scription,  294. 

Jerry,  342. 

Jerseys,  see  New  Jersey;  retreat  across, 
135,  136. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  vice  president,  425,  426 ; 
president,  427-431 ;  amnesty  policy,  437. 

Johnson,  Herschel  V.,  361. 

Johnson,  R.  M.,  311. 

Johnston,  Gen.  A.  S.,  390. 

Johnston,  Gen.  Joseph  E.,  393,  398,  399,  402, 
404,  406,  428. 

Joliet,  Louis,  62. 

Jones,  John  Paul,  147-149. 

Julian,  George  W.,  346. 

J  union  ville,  86. 


Kanawha  state,  386. 

Kansas,  struggle  for,  346,  347,  350,  351,  352  ; 
slavery  question  in,  357,  358,  363;  ad 
mitted,  358,  436  ;  rapid  growth,  456 ; 
Fanners'  Alliance.  468. 

Kansas  City,  332.  455. 

Kansas-Nebraska  Law,  347,  352,  354,  356. 

Kaskaskia  settled.  191. 

Kearny,  Colonel  Stephen,  329,  333. 

Keamarge,  413. 


25 


INDEX 


Kendall,  Amos,  314. 

Kentucky,  settled,  191  ;  resolutions,  212,  213  ; 

admitted,  243  ;   Confederates  in,  388,  390, 

391  ;  slavery  in,  429. 
Key,    Francis    8.,    writes    Star-Spangled 

Banner.  238  n.  2. 
Kickapoo  Indians,  62. 
King  George's  War,  80,  81. 
King  Philip's  War,  72. 
King  William's  War,  70-78. 
King,  Rufus,  229,  259. 
King,  William  R.,  346. 
Kings  Mountain,  battle  of,  144,  145. 
Kirtland,  292. 

Knights  of  Labor,  460,  461,  468. 
Know-nothing  party,  353,  854,  355,  363. 
Knox,  General  Henry,  198. 
Ku  Klux  Klan,  439,  440,  442. 


L 


La  Salle,  Robert  de,  62-65,  76,  79. 

Labor,  in   1763,   95-98;    in   1790,   182,   183; 

questions   in    1860,   375,  376;   after   Civil 

War,  442-445,  460,  461,  462,  464,  465,  466; 

slave  and  free,  454  ;   foreign  and   convict, 

461  ;  parties,  464,  465.  468,  469,  470. 
Labor  department  established,  465. 
Laconia,  47. 

Lafayette,  Marquis  de,  138  n.  1. 
Lake  Charnplain,  battle  of,  236. 
Lake  Erie,  battle  of,  234,  235. 
Lancaster,  Congress  at,  139. 
Land  grants,   free,  335;    to  railroads,   435; 

opposed,  439,  442,  443,  447,  461,  462. 
Land  Mortgage  scheme,  469. 
Lane,  Joseph,  361. 
Lane,  Ralph,  27. 
Larimer,  General,  433. 
Laud,  Archbishop,  47. 
Laudonniere,  23,  24. 
Lawrence,  235. 
Lawrence  settled,  350,  351  n.  1. 
Lawrence,  Amos  A.,  350. 
Lawrence,  James,  237. 
Leavenworth,  329,  351  n.  1,  433,  434. 
Lecompton  constitution,  357  n.  1,  358. 
Lee,  Charles,  135,  136,  142. 
Lee,  Richard  Henry,  132. 
Lee,  Robert  E.,  campaigns  in  Civil  War,  359, 

394,  396,  397,  399,  402,  404, 405 ;  surrenders, 

405,  406. 

Lenni  Lenape  Indians,  72. 
Leopard,  227,  230. 
Letters  of  marque,  147. 
Lewis,  Meriwether,  219,  331. 
Lewiston  founded,  436. 
Lexington,  147. 
Lexington,  battle  of,  127,  128. 
Lexington,  Ky.,  settled,  191. 
Liberal  Republican  party,  442. 
Liberator,  313. 
Liberty  party,  315,  325,  335. 
Limestone  settled,  194. 
Lincoln,   Abraham,   debates  with   Douglas, 

in    Illinois   senatorial    contest,    358,    359 ; 

elected  president,  363 ;  during  Civil  War, 

878-418;   inauguration  speech,  381,    382; 


Emancipation  Proclamation,  394-396 ;  Get- 
tysburg  Address,  397 ;  peace  conference 
with  Stephens,  405;  reflected,  425,  426; 
assassinated,  426. 

Lincoln,  General,  143,  144. 

Line  of  Demarcation,  15,  16. 

Little  Belt,  230. 

Livingston,  Robert  R.,  132. 

Loan-office  certificates,  199. 

Log  cabin  campaign,  315,  316. 

Log  cabins,  270-273. 

Log  of  the  Mayflower,  44  n.  1,  45. 

Logan,  John  A.,  465. 

Logstown,  84. 

London  Company,  30,  31,  41. 

Long,  Dr.,  374. 

Long,  Major,  331,  332 ;  discovers  Longs 
Peak,  331. 

Long  houses,  Indian,  67. 

Long  Parliament,  107. 

Lookout  Mountain,  battle  of,  399. 

Lords  of  Trade,  86,  107. 

Lottery,  Congress,  200. 

Louis  XV.  claims  Ohio  region,  82. 

Louisburg,  built,  80  ;  captured  by  English, 
81,  89  ;  restored  to  French,  81. 

Louisiana,  La  Salle  in,  64;  extent  of,  76; 
French  in,  79,  80 ;  struggle  for,  83-91  ; 
Spanish,  91 ;  purchased,  218,  219,  274,  275 ; 
admitted,  246  ;  boundary,  261,  262  ;  secedes, 
378 ;  reconstructs  government,  428 ;  re 
admitted,  431. 

Louisville,  settled,  194 ;  labor  congress  at, 
443. 

Lovejoy,  Elijah,  314. 

Lowell  founded,  290. 

Lundy,  Benjamin,  313. 

Lundys  Lane,  battle  of,  235. 

Lyon,  General,  388. 


:\r 


McClellan,  General  George  B.,  campaigns, 
388,  392-394  ;  presidential  nominee,  426. 

McCormick  reaper,  371,  372. 

McDonough,  Thomas,  236. 

McDowell,  General  Irwin,  campaigns,  387, 
388,  392-394. 

McKinley,  William,  president,  475,  476-486. 

McKinley  Tariff  Act,  467,  473. 

Macedonian,  236. 

Macomb,  General,  236. 

Macon  Bill,  229. 

Madison,  James,  on  the  Constitution,  166  n.  1, 
167 ;  Republican  leader,  203  ;  favors  Vir 
ginia  Resolutions,  212  ;  president,  229-257. 

Magellan,  17,  18. 

Mails,  see  Postal  System. 

Maine,  settled,  47,  48;  part  of  Massachusetts 
Bay  colony,  53  ;  admitted,  274,  276,  277. 

Maine  Law,  444. 

Manassas  Junction,  battle  of,  387,  388. 

Manhattan  Island,  37. 

Manila,  battle  of,  478. 

Manufactures,  in  colonial  times,  98,  99,  102; 
about  1800,  248  ;  infant,  249,  250,  296,  297  ; 
in  slave  states,  376;  during  Civil  War, 
423 ;  since  Civil  War,  454,  455. 


26 


INDEX 


March  to  the  Sea,  Sherman's,  399,  402,  403. 

Marcos,  Fray,  21. 

Marietta  settled.  193,  194. 

Marion,  144. 

Marquette,  62. 

Marshall,  337. 

Marshall,  John,  210. 

Martin,  Luther,  166  n.  i. 

Mary,  Queen,  grants  Massachusetts  charter, 
53. 

Maryland,  colonized,  34-36  ;  in  colonial  times, 
101,  103-105 ;  slavery  in,  429. 

Mason,  Charles,  56  n.  1. 

Mason,  James  If.,  412. 

Mason,  John,  47,  48. 

Mason  and  Dixon's  Line,  56  n.  1. 

Massachusetts,  Bay  Company,  46,  47  ;  reli 
gious  intolerance  in,  48,  49  ;  Bay  charter 
granted,  46,  53;  in  colonial  times,  101, 102  ; 
opposes  Stamp  and  Townshend  Acts,  114, 
118;  Bill,  120,  126,  155  ;  cedes  land  to  Con 
gress,  158,  159. 

Matagorda  Bav,  64. 

Matamoras,  battle  of,  327. 

Maximilian,  450. 

Afaygovier.  41-44. 

Mayflower  Compact,  43,  44. 

Mayflower  Log,  44  n.  1,  45. 

Maysville  settled,  194. 

Meade,  General.  396,  397. 

Mechanical  improvements,  289,  290,  459^61. 

Mechanicsville,  394. 

Memphis  captured,  889,  390. 

Mendoza,  21. 

Menendez,  24. 

Mercer,  149. 

Merrimac,  414-418. 

Mexico,  becomes  republic,  263,  264;  wars, 
320-322,  326-328,  333  ;  French  in,  450. 

Miami  Indians,  62. 

Michigan,  a  territory,  246 ;  admitted,  366. 

Michiliinackinac,  trading  post,  62. 

Middle  Colonies,  occupations,  etc.,  101-103. 

Milan  Decree,  226,  229,  230. 

Milford  founded,  51. 

Military  lands,  160. 

Mill  Springs,  battle  of,  388. 

Mills,  K.  Q.,  466. 

Mills  Tariff  Bill,  466. 

Milwaukee,  population  in  1840,  365. 

Minneapolis  mills,  455. 

Minnesota,  415,  416. 

Minnesota,  slavery  in,  356;  a  territory,  366; 
admitted,  368. 

Mint  established,  254. 

Minute  men,  126,  127. 

Missionary  Eidge,  battle  of,  399. 

Mississippi  River,  explored,  22,  61-64; 
French  forts  built  on,  79,  80 ;  right  of 
navigation,  209,  218;  slavery  west  of,  275- 
277  ;  campaign  in  Civil  War,  8SS-S90,  397- 
399,  418. 

Mississippi,  a  territory,  245,  246 ;  admitted, 
274;  secedes,  378;  convention  in,  380; 
opposed  to  Reconstruction  Act,  439,  440; 
again  in  the  Union,  445. 

Missouri,  admitted,  274,  276,  277;  opposes 
Wilmot  Proviso,  336 ;  elects  Kansas  dele 
gate,  351  ;  slavery  in,  429. 


Missouri  Compromise,  276,  313,  347,  354, 356. 
Missouri  River,  gold  discovered  on,  436. 
Mobile,  in  colonial  times,  99 ;  captured,  150, 

418. 

Mobile  Bay  explored,  79,  80  ;  British  in,  239. 
Mohawk  Indians,  60,  68,  72. 
Mohegan  Indians,  68,  71. 
Molino  del  Rey,  battle  of,  328. 
Money,  see  Currency,  Gold,  and  Silver. 
Monitor,  415-417. 
Monmouth,  battle  of,  142. 
Monroe,    James,    Republican    leader,    203 ; 

treaty  with  England,  226  ;  president,  259- 

277,  294-297. 

Monroe  Doctrine,  264,  450,  474. 
Montana,   a  territory,  436 ;    admitted,   456, 

457  ;  silver  interests,  472,  475. 
Montcalm,  General,  SS,  89,  90. 
Monterey,  Cal.,  Fremont  at,  332. 
Monterey,  Mexico,  battle  of,  327. 
Montezuma,  19. 

Montgomery,  Confederate  capital,  378,  386. 
Montgomery,  Richard,  131. 
Montreal,  attacked,  77 ;    captured,  90,  131  ; 

attacked  in  1813,  235. 
Moose  Island  captured,  237. 
Morgan,  Daniel,  141,  146. 
Morgan,  William.  300. 
Mormons,  292,  446. 
Morris,  Robert,  149. 
Morris,  Thomas,  324. 
Morristown,  Washington  at,  137. 
Morse,  Samuel  F.  B..  289,  372. 
Morton.  Dr.,  373,  374. 
Morton,  Levi  P.,  467. 
Moultrie,  149. 

Mount  Desert  Island  settled,  60. 
Mount  Pleasant  settled,  267. 
Mount  Vernon.  Washington's  home,  149, 173. 
Mugwumps,  465. 
Murfreesboro,  battle  of,  391. 
Murray,  William  Vans,  214. 
Muskhogee  Indians,  68. 
Mutiny  Act,  117. 

N 

Nantucket  Island  captured,  237. 

Napoleon,  consul  of  France,  214,  225  ;  issues 
decrees,  225,  226  ;  seizes  American  vessels, 
229,  230  ;  loses  power,  259. 

Napoleon.  Louis,  in  Mexico.  450. 

Narragansett  Indians,  68,  72. 

Narvaez,  20. 

Nashville,  settled,  191  ;  evacuated,  389 ;  bat 
tle  of,  404. 

Nassau,  blockade  running,  411,  412. 

Natchez,  in  colonial  times,  99  ;  captured,  150, 
392  n.  1 ;  claimed  by  Spaniards,  152. 

National  Agricultural  Wheel,  468. 

National  Bank,  First,  201,  202.  203.  246.  248; 
loses  charter,  255;  Second,  256,  305-307, 
303  ;  proposed  Third,  312,  316. 

National  banks,  421. 

National  Bimetallic  League,  472. 

National  debt,  see  Debt. 

National  Democratic  party,  475. 

National  Labor  Congress,  443. 

National  Labor  Reform  party,  442,  443. 


27 


INDEX 


National  notes,  see  Bonds. 

National  party,  465,  475. 

National  Pike,  252. 

National  Prohibition  Reform  party,  444. 

National  Republican  party,  see  Republican. 

National  Union  party,  425,  426. 

Native  American  party,  353-355,  363. 

Naturalization  law,  211,  353. 

Naumkeag  settled,  46. 

Nauvoo  built,  292. 

Naval  warfare,  in  Revolution,  147-149 ;  in 
French  Wai,  213;  in  War  of  1812,  236-238; 
in  Civil  War,  410-418. 

Navigation  Acts,  108. 

Navy  department,   211,  213. 

Nebraska  Bill,  346,  347. 

Nebraska,  struggle  for,  347 ;  admitted,  436  ; 
rapid  growth,  456. 

Neutrality,  Proclamation  of,  206,  207  ;  policy, 
224. 

Nevada,  acquired,  334  n.  1  ;  territory  and 
state,  435,. 436  ;  silver  interests,  472,  475. 

New  Albion,  27  n.  1. 

New  Amsterdam,  founded,  37;  becomes 
New  York,  55. 

New  England,  early  settlements,  40-53 ;  oc 
cupations  in  colonies,  101,  102 ;  English 
victories  in,  937,  238. 

New  England  Emigrant  Aid  Society,  350. 

New  France,  extent  of,  60 ;  struggle  for,  76- 
91. 

New  Hampshire,  settled,  47,  48 ;  in  colonial 
times,  101,  102;  grants,  243. 

New  Haven,  colony,  51 ;  in  colonial  times,  99  ; 
riot  at,  116. 

New  Jersey,  settled,  55;  in  colonial  times, 
101, 102, 103  ;  plan  for  Constitution,  166, 167. 

New  London,  riot  at,  116;  burned,  146. 

New  Mexico,  Spanish  explore,  21  •  con 
quered,  329 ;  slavery  in,  334,  341  ;  bought 
from  Texas,  339-341  ;  silver  interests,  472. 

New  Netherland,  37,  38,  39  ;  becomes  New 
York,  55. 

New  Orleans,  founded,  80  ;  in  colonial  times, 
99 ;  battle  of,  238,  239 ;  captured,  391,  392, 
418. 

"  New  Roof,"  169,  170. 

New  Sweden,  39. 

"  New  tenor,"  200. 

New  York  (state),  New  Netherland  be 
comes,  55;  in  colonial  times,  102,  103; 
English  in,  139,  140,  142,  143  ;  cedes  land 
to  Congress,  158. 

New  York  (city),  convention,  77  ;  in  colonial 
times,  99  ;  colonial  congress  at,  115  ;  evacu 
ated,  149,  150;  national  capital,  170-172, 
201  ;  the  metropolis,  284 ;  in  1830,  290 ; 
labor  congress  at,  443. 

New  York,  Newfoundland,  and  London 
Telegraph  Company,  374,  875. 

Newark,  founded,  53  n.  1 ;  riot  at,  116. 

Newbern  captured,  418. 

Newfoundland,  granted  to  English,  79  ;  fish 
eries,  101,  450,  451. 

Newport,  Ky.,  settled,  194. 

Newport,  R.I.,  settled,  50  ;  riot  at,  116. 

Newspapers,  in  colonial  times,  95, 96 ;  in  1790, 
179,  180;  about  1810,  248. 

Newtown  settled,  47. 


Niagara,  235. 

Niagara,  founded,  80  ;  expedition  against,  88. 

Nina,  11,  13. 

Nipmuck  Indians,  72. 

Nominating  conventions,  306,  307,  822. 

Non-importation,  agreements,  117  ;  Act,  226, 
227,  229. 

Non-intercourse  Law,  228,  229. 

Norfolk  evacuated,  418. 

North,  Lord,  149. 

North  American  party,  354. 

North  Carolina,  settled,  54,  55 ;  in  colonial 
times,  101,  103-105;  cedes  land  to  Con 
gress,  162,  192  ;  secedes,  386  ;  Sherman  in, 
404 ;  readmitted,  431. 

North  Castle  136. 

North  Dakota  admitted,  456,  457. 

Northern  attitude  toward  slavery,  336;  339, 
352,  376,  3SO,  381,  383  394,  395. 

Northern  Pacific  Railroad,  456. 

Northwest,  exploration  of,  219,  329,  331,  832, 
333  ;  the  new,  454-458. 

Northwest  passage  to  India,  18. 

Northwest  Territory,  161,  162;  surrendered, 
233  ;  Indian  troubles  in,  L42,  245  ;  slavery 
question  in,  274. 

Notes,  United  States,  see  Bonds. 

Nova  Scotia,  part  of  Massachusetts  Bay  col 
ony,  53  ;  struggle  for,  79-81. 

Nueces  River,  326. 

Nullification  doctrine,  213,  303,  304,  305. 


Observer,  314. 

O'Conor,  Charles,  442,  443. 

Oglethorpe,  James,  57,  58. 

Ohio,  settled,  192-194;   admitted,  244,  245; 

currency  \  Ian,  438,  439. 
Ohio  Land  Company,  83,  161,  192,  193,  194. 
Ohio  River,  struggle  for,  79-88 ;  settlements 

on,  192-194. 

Oklahoma  Territory,  458. 
Old  Demand  notes,  420. 
Old  Ironsides,  236. 
Olmsted,  F.  L.,  442. 
Omnibus  Bill,  341. 
Omnibuses,  291. 
Oneida  Indians.  68. 
Onondaga  Indians,  68,  78. 
Orders  in  Council  of  1806  and  1807,  225,  226, 

229,  231,  239. 
Ordinance,  how  passed,  159  ;  of  1785,  160  ;  of 

1787,  160-162,  197,  274. 

Oregon,  settled,  219,  220,  368;  joint  occupa 
tion  of,  261,  322-325;  boundaries  of,  262; 

trail,  329,  331  ;  a  territory,  326,  356,  366 ; 

slavery  in,  356. 
Orleans  Territory,  246. 
Ossawatomie  settled,  851  n.  1. 
Oswego  burned,  89. 
Otis,  James,  149. 
Overland  stage,  434. 
Owen,  Robert,  291. 


Pacific  Fur  Company,  221. 

Pacific  Ocean,  discovered,  17 ;  named,  18. 


28 


INDEX 


Pacific  railroads,  361,  363,  434,  435. 

Pacific  States  settled,  366,  368. 

Pakenham,  General,  239. 

Palmer,  John  M.,  415. 

Palmyra.  Mormons  at,  292. 

Palo  Alto,  battle  of,  327. 

Panic,  of  1837,  310,  311 ;  of  1873,  445,  460  ;  of 
1893,  472. 

Paper  currency,  163,  164,  199,  253,  254,  437, 
445,  447. 

Parker,  Joel,  443. 

Party  platforms,  see  Platforms. 

Patent  office,  370. 

Patroons,  38. 

Patterson,  General,  388. 

Paulding,  144  n.  1. 

Pea  Ridge,  battle  of,  389,  391. 

Peacock,  '237. 

Pelican,  237. 

Pemberton,  General,  398. 

Pendleton,  George  H.,  426. 

Pendleton  Civil  Service  Act,  464. 

Peninsular  campaign,  392-394. 

Penn,  William,  settles  New  Jersey  and  Penn 
sylvania,  55,  56;  relations  with  Indians, 
71,  72. 

Pennsylvania,  granted  to  Penn,  55,  56 ;  in 
colonial  times,  71,  72,  101,  102, 103  ;  opposes 
Townshend  Acts,  118;  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence  in,  13  , 135  ;  Confederates  in,  396. 

Pennsylvania  Freeman,  314. 

Pennsylvania  Gazette.  85,  116. 

Pennsylvania  Journal^  116. 

Pennsylvania  Packet,  1$0. 

Pennsylvania  route  to  West,  284,  285. 

Pensacola  captured,  150,  261,  418. 

Pensions,  422,  467. 

People's  party,  468,  469,  470,  476,  485. 

Pequot  Indians,  68,  71. 

Perote,  328. 

Perry,  Oliver  Hazard,  234,  235. 

Perry  ville,  battle  of,  391. 

Personal  Liberty  laws,  343,  352,  361,  380. 

"  Pet  banks,"  307,  312. 

Petersburg,  in  colonial  times,  104;  Corn- 
wallis  at,  146 ;  besieged,  404 ;  evacuated, 

406; 

Petroleum,  455. 

Philadelphia,  founded,  56;  in  colonial  times, 
99  ;  First  Continental  Congress,  121  ;  cap 
tured,  137-139  ;  Congress  at,  139  ;  evacu 
ated,  142 ;  constitutional  convention  at, 
165-169  ;  in  1SOO,  179  ;  national  capital,  201. 

Philanthropist,  314. 

Philippines,  478,  480-4*3. 

Phips,  Sir  William,  77. 

Phwnix,  252,  253. 

Photographic  discoveries,  373,  459. 

Pickens,  144. 

Pickens,  Governor,  378,  382. 

Pierce,  Franklin,  president,  346-355. 

Pike,  Zebulon,  220,  221.  881. 

Pikes  Peak,  220,  331,  433. 

Pilgrims,  41-46. 

Pinckney,  C.  C.,  minister  to  France,  210  ; 
Federalist  candidate,  215,  229 :  treaty  with 
England,  226. 

Pineda,  17. 

Pinta,  11, 18. 


Pinzon,  12,  14. 

Pitt,  William,  89. 

Pittsburg,  founded,  85 ;  in  1790,  192 ;  rebel 
lion  at,  204. 

Pittsburg  Landing,  battle  of,  389,  390. 

Plains  of  Abraham,  89. 

Platforms,  party,  203,  209,  210,  216,  259,  296, 
297,  300,  301,  306,  307,  314,  315,  324,  334, 
335,  346,  353-355,  360,  361,  363,  425,  426, 
439,  442-444,  446,  447,  462,  464,  465,  469, 
470,  475,  476. 

Platte  country,  347. 

Plattsburg,  battle  of,  236. 

Plymouth,  charter,  29,  30  ;  Company,  30,  40, 
43,  44 ;  settled,  44,  46  ;  part  of  Massachu 
setts  Bay  colony,  53. 

Pocahontas,  72,  73. 

Poictiers,  237. 

Political  issues,  see  Platforms. 

Political  parties,  beginning  of,  197-205 ;  see 
Federalists,  Democrats,  Republicans,  etc. 

Polk,  James  K.,  presidential  nominee,  322 ; 
president,  324-335. 

Polygamy,  446,  462,  464. 

Ponce  de  Leon,  17. 

Pony  express,  434. 

Pope,  General  John,  campaigns,  389,  394. 

Popham,  Sir  John,  40. 

Popular  sovereignty,  339,  341,  347,  351,  355, 
358,  359,  360,  361. 

Population,  in  1790,  176-178,  190,  191;  in 
1815,  241;  in  1810,  246;  in  1820,  268,  269. 
273;  increase  in,  290;  of  Oregon,  324; 
western  immigrant,  353 ;  between  1840 
and  1860,  365-367 ;  in  1870,  436 ;  of  north 
western  states,  455-457  ;  of  Oklahoma,  458. 

Populists,  see  People's  Party. 

Port  Gibson,  battle  of,  398. 

Port  Hudson,  battle  of,  391,  397,  398. 

Port  Royal,  settled,  60  ;  French  stronghold, 
77  ;  captured,  78 ;  called  Annapolis,  79. 

Port  Royal,  S.  C.,  captured,  417. 

Portage  Railroad,  286,  287. 

Porter,  at  Vicksburg,  398. 

Porto  Rico,  14.  480,  481,  488. 

Portsmouth,  settled,  50 ;  in  colonial  times, 
99  ;  navy  yard,  414,  415. 

Portuguese  in  Brazil,  16. 

Postage  stamps,  335.  369,  370.  421. 

Postal  system,  in  colonial  times,  94  ;  in  1790, 
181,  182  ;  in  1840,  369,  370 ;  in  1860,  434. 

Powhatan  Indians,  68,  72. 

Prairie  schooners,  434. 

Prescott,  Colonel,  129,  130. 

President,  230. 

Presidential  election,  method  of,  168,  170, 
171,  216;  proposed  method  of,  476. 

Presidential  succession,  463,  464. 

Presque  Isle  built,  83. 

Price,  General,  391. 

Princeton,  battle  of,  137. 

Printing  press,  94,  180,  248. 

Proclamation,  line,  110,  158;  of  neutrality, 
262 ;  Emancipation,  429. 

Progress,  from  1790  to  1815,  241-265;  from 
1840  to  1860,  365-377  ;  since  Civil  War,  454- 
461. 

Prohibition  party,  444,  446,  462,  465,  467,  470, 
475,  485. 


29 


INDEX 


Proprietary  colonies,  105,  106. 

Proscription,  political,  294,  295. 

Proslavery  movement,  313-315,  334,  347,  350, 

351,  35T. 
Protection,   South   opposes,   303,   304;   Clay 

favors,  307  ;  political  issue,  462. 
Providence,  founded,  50 ;  in  colonial  times, 

99  ;  riot  at,  116. 
Provincial  colonies,  105,  106. 
Public  domain,  granted,  159,  160;  additions 
.  to,  162,  218,  245,  246,  333,  334,  451 ;  grants, 

see  Land  grants. 
Puebla,  328. 

Puerto  Rico,  see  Porto  Rico. 
Pulaski,  149. 

Punishment,  forms  of,  182,  183,  185,  294. 
Puritans,  40;    persecution   of,  47;    in   New 

England,  46-53  ;  become  Separatists,  48. 
Putnam,  149. 

Q 

Quaker  settlements,  55,  56. 

Quartering  Act,  120,  122. 

Quebec,  boundaries  of,  110. 

Quebec,  settled,  60 ;  French  stronghold,  77 ; 

attacked,  77,  78 ;  surrendered,  89,  !>0. 
Quebec  Act,  121. 
Queen  Anne's  War,  78,  79. 
Queenstown,  battle  of,  233. 
Quincy,  Josiah,  119. 


Radical  Republicans,  425,  426. 

Railroads,  early,  285-289,  366,  868,  369  :  West 
ern,  434,  435 ;  Northern  Pacific,  456 ;  in 
1887,  465;  land  grants  to,  435,  439,  442, 
443,  447,  461,  462. 

Ralegh,  Sir  Walter,  27-29. 

Randolph,  John,  203. 

"Receivers  general"  created,  312. 

Reconstruction  Act,  430,  431. 

Reconstruction  policy,  425-431,  437,  439,  440, 
461. 

Redemptioners,  97,  98,  105. 

Refunding  Act,  448. 

Reid,  Whitelaw,  470. 

Reprisal,  147. 

Republicans,  old  party,  203,  206,  207,  209, 
210,  211,  215,  228,  229,  256,  259,  260,  295, 
296,  297,  300,  306;  new  party,  354,  357, 
363,  380,  381,  425,  426,  435/439,  442,  446, 
447,  462^67,  470,  475,  485. 

Resaca  de  la  Palma,  battle  of,  327. 

Restoration,  English,  107. 

Resumption  of  Specie  Payment  Act,  446, 
447,  471. 

Revenge,  148. 

Revolutionary  War,  126-152. 

Rhode  Island,  settled,  50  ;  charter,  52,  53 ; 
in  colonial  times,  101,  102. 

Ribault,  John,  23,  24. 

Richmond,  Confederate  capital,  386 ;  cam 
paign  against,  392-394  ;  captured,  406,  426. 

Rio  Grande,  20,  76,  221,  326,  327. 

Ripon,  convention  at,  354. 


Rittenhouse,  David,  135. 

Roads,  improvements,   251,   252 ;  Western, 

284-288. 

Roanoke  I.,  colonized,  27,  28  ;  captured,  418. 
Robertson,  James,  191. 
Robinson,  John,  41. 
Rochester  settled,  267. 
Rogers,  Captain,  230. 
Rolfe,  John,  73. 
Roosevelt,  Theodore,  486. 
Rosecrans,  General,  campaigns,  391,  398,  399. 
Ross,  General,  238. 
Roxbury  settled,  47. 
Royal  colonies,  105,  106. 
Rule  of  1756,  207,  208. 
Rumsey,  James,  252. 
Russell,  John,  444. 
Russia,  possessions,  9  ;  claims  on  the  Pacific, 

262  ;  complies  with  Monroe  Doctrine,  265 ; 

attitude  in  Civil   War,  383,  449;    Alaska 

purchased  from,  451. 
Ryal,  Captain,  80. 

S 

Sacketts  Harbor,  battle  of,  236. 

Sacramento,  337. 

St.  Augustine  founded,  23,  24. 

St.  Clair's  defeat,  242. 

St.  Croix  River  settlements,  60. 

St.  John,  John  P.,  465. 

St.  Joseph  captured,  150. 

St.  Lawrence  River  explored,  60. 

St.  Leger,  Colonel,  139-141. 

St.  Louis,  99. 

St.  Marks  captured,  261. 

St.  Marys  founded,  36. 

St.  Paul,  456. 

Salem  settled,  46. 

Salmon  Falls  massacre,  77. 

Saltillo,  327. 

Sampson,  W.  T.,  478-480. 

San  Jacinlo,  412. 

San  Jacinto,  battle  of,  321. 

San  Salvador,  13  n.  1. 

Santa  Anna,  321,  327,  328. 

Santa  Fe,  23  ;  captured,  329 ;  trail,  331. 

Santa  Maria,  11,  13. 

Santiago,  battles  of,  478-480. 

Saratoga,  battle  of,  141. 

Savan nah,  374. 

Savannah,  founded,  58;  in  colonial  times, 
99  ;  captured,  143,  402,  403,  426. 

Schenectadv  massacre,  77. 

Schley,  W/S.,  478-480. 

Schools,  free.  368,  375. 

Schuyler,  General,  139,  141. 

Scientific  discoveries,  94,  95,  366,  459-4ol. 

Scioto  Company,  161,  192,  194. 

Scott,  General  Winfield,  in  1814,  235;  in 
Mexican  War,  327,  328 ;  presidential  nomi 
nee,  346 ;  in  Civil  War,  387. 

Sea  to  sea  grants,  46,  121,  158,  159,  160,  162. 

Secession,  of  Southern  States,  378-380: 
states  refuse  troops,  386,  387 ;  reconstruc 
tion  plans,  427-431. 

Sedition  Law,  211,  212,  216. 

Seminole  Indians,  68,  260,  261,  458. 

Senate  formed,  167. 


30 


INDEX 


Seneca  Indians,  68, 148. 

Separatists,  40-46,  48. 

Serapis,  148,  149. 

Seven  Cities  of  Cibola,  20-22. 

Seven  days'  battles,  394. 

Seven  Pines,  battle  of,  393. 

Sevier,  John,  192. 

Sewall,  Arthur,  475,  4T6. 

Seward,  William  H.,  340,  347,  350,  405. 

Sewing  machine  invented,  371. 

Seymour,  Horatio,  439. 

Shadrach,  342. 

Shannon,  237. 

Sharpsburg,  battle  of,  394. 

Shawnee  Indians,  68. 

Shays,  Daniel,  164. 

Shenandoah,  413,  414,  450. 

Shenandoah  valley,  war  in,  392,  404,  405. 

Sheridan,  General  Phil.,  campaigns,  404,  405, 

Sherman,  Koger,  132. 

Sherman,  General  "W.  T.,  campaigns,  399, 
402-406,  426. 

Sherman  Act,  467,  468,  470 ;  silver-purchase 
clause  repealed,  472,  473. 

Shiloh,  battle  of,  389,  390. 

Ship  Island,  392. 

Shirley,  Governor,  80,  81. 

Silver,  specie  suspended,  420,  421 ;  mines 
discovered,  435,  456;  demonetized,  448; 
remonetized,  448,  449 ;  certificates,  449  ; 
free  coinage  of,  467,  469 ;  movement,  472, 
473,  475 ;  party,  476. 

"  Silver  Grays,"  355. 

Sioux  Indians,  456. 

Sir  i us,  374. 

Six  Nations,  143. 

Slave  trade  forbidden,  355. 

Slavery,  established,  33, 34 ;  in  colonial  times, 
97,  105 ;  in  territories,  162,  346-363  ;  at 
time  of  Constitution,  167,  168;  in  1790, 
185-187  ;  affected  by  cotton  industry,  195, 
196  ;  in  Kentucky,  243  ;  in  early  states,  274, 
275;  beyond  Mississippi  Eiver,  275,  276; 
issue  between  North  and  South,  303  ;  area 
expanded,  320-343  ;  in  Texas,  322  ;  in  New 
Mexico  and  California,  334,  335;  in  Kan 
sas,  347,  350,  351;  in  1857,  355,  356;  in 
1860,  376 ;  Civil  War,  378-418 ;  Emancipa 
tion  Proclamation,  394-396;  during  Civil 
War,  424 ;  abolished  in  Confederate  States, 
429  ;  position  of  negroes  after  war,  439-442. 

Slidell,  John,  412. 

Smith,  Green  Clay,  446. 

Smith,  John,  at  Jamestown,  31,  32  ;  explores 
New  England  coast,  40;  among  the  Indi 
ans,  72. 

Smith,  Joseph,  292. 

Social  conditions,  in  1790,  175-196;  about 
1890,  459-161. 

Socialist  Labor  party,  476,  485. 

Society  for  Encouragement  of  Domestic  Man 
ufactures,  250. 

Solis,  14. 

Somers,  Sir  George,  32. 

Sons  of  Liberty,  116. 

South  American  republics,  263,  264. 

South  Carolina,  settled,  54,  55 ;  in  colonial 
times,  101, 103-105;  cedes  land  to  Congress, 


162;  Eailroad,  286;  Exposition,  803;  fa 
vors  nullification,  303,  304;  secedes,  878, 
394;  Sherman  in,  404  ;  readmitted,  481. 

South  Dakota,  admitted,  456,  457;  silver 
interests,  472,  475. 

South  Pass,  332. 

Southern  Colonies,  occupations,  etc.,  101, 
103-105. 

Southern  States,  English  in,  143-146;  atti 
tude  toward  slavery,  335,  336,  339,  356, 357  ; 
form  Confederacy,  336  ;  at  end  of  1860,  376  ; 
at  beginning  of  war,  383  ;  coast  blockade, 
410-418;  cost  of  war  in,  422-424;  recon 
struction  of,  425-431 ;  troubles  in,  439-442  ; 
the  New  South,  454,  455. 

Spanish,  possessions,  9,  91;  settlements,  etc., 
19-25;  claims,  150-152  ;  boundary  line,  261, 
262;  Florida  bought  from,  261;  war  with 
United  States,  477-481. 

Spanish  America,  264. 

Specie  Circular,  309. 

Specie  payments,  163,  255,  256,  811,  420,  421, 
437,  438,  445,  446. 

Speculation  in  1836,  308-310. 

Speedwell,  41. 

Spottsylvania  Courthouse,  battle  of,  404. 

Springfield,  settled,  50;  Republican  state 
convention  at,  358  n.  1 ;  Lincoln's  speech 
at,  395. 

Squatter  sovereignty,  see  Popular  Sov 
ereignty. 

Squatters,  192,  350. 

Stagecoaches,  100,  188,  484. 

Stamford  founded,  51. 

Stamp  Act,  112-117,  121,  122. 

Stamp  tax,  214. 

Standish,  Miles,  41. 

Stanton,  431. 

Star  of  the  West,  379. 

Star-Spangled  Banner,  238  n.  2. 

Stark.  Colonel  John,  140. 

State  banks,  255,  256,  305-307,  308,  310-812, 
421,  446. 

State  debts,  203,  421,  422. 

State  department,  198. 

Staten  Island  evacuated,  150  n.  1. 

States,  formed,  132,  155;  thirteen  original, 
155,  175-196;  trade  laws,  164,  165;  powers 
of,  169  ;  new  constitutions  in,  294 ;  sov 
ereignty  of,  383  ;  government  in  seceded, 
427-481. 

Steamboats,  190,  191,  252,  253,  280,  281,  366, 
368,  369,  374. 

Stephens,  Alexander  H.,  378,  380,  405. 

Steuben,  Baron,  141,  149. 

Stevens,  John,  253,  285. 

Stevenson,  Adlai  E.,  470. 

Stewart,  G.  T..  446. 

Stillwater,  battle  of,  141. 

Stockton,  Commodore,  329,  333. 

"Stonewall"  Jackson,  393. 

Stonington  bombarded,  238. 

Stony  Point  captured,  142. 

Stowe,  H.  B.,  343. 

Stuart.  295. 

Stuyvesant,  Peter,  89. 

Subtreasury  plan,  469. 

Sugar  Act,  112. 

Sullivan,  General,  136,  143. 


McM.  HTST.— 81         31 


INDEX 


Sumner,  Charles,  347. 

Sumter,  412,  418. 

Sumter,  144. 

Suiuter,  Fort,  379,  382,  383,  418. 

Supreme  Court,  established,  169,   197,   198; 

gives  Dred  Scott  decision,  356;  on  Wilson 

Bill,  473. 
Surplus  revenue,  in   1837,  309-312 ;  in  1887, 

466. 

Surprise,,  148. 
Sutter,  337. 

Sutter's  Fort,  332,  337. 
Swedish,    possessions,   9  :    settlements,    38, 

39. 
Symmes,  John  C.,  192. 


Taney,  Roger  B.,  307  n.  4. 

Tariff,  of  1789,  197;  bills  of  1824,  etc.,  303, 
304,  810;  of  1861,  419,  420;  for  revenue 
only,  463 ;  Mills  Bill,  466,  467  ;  McKinley 
Act.  467,  473  ;  revision  of  1896,  476. 

Tarleton,  Commander,  146. 

Taxation,  in  colonies,  112-122  ;  of  1861,  419, 
420 ;  of  bonds  demanded,  439  ;  of  Chinese, 
443  ;  a  political  issue,  466. 

Taylor,  General  Zachary,  in  Mexican  War, 
326-329  ;  president,  334-341 ;  death  of,  341. 

Tea  tax,  119,  120. 

Tecumseh,  246. 

Telegraph,  372,  459. 

Temperance  party,  444. 

Tender  Acts,  164. 

Tennessee,  settled,  191 ;  part  of  public  do 
main,  192  ;  admitted,  244  ;  opposes  Wihnot 
Proviso.  336 ;  secedes,  386 ;  reconstructs 
government,  428  ;  readmitted,  430,  431. 

Tenure  of  Office  Act,  295,  430,  431. 

Territory  formed,  160-162. 

Terry,  Eli,  248. 

Texas,  becomes  independent,  320-322;  an 
nexed  to  United  States,  324-326;  boun 
daries  of,  321,  339-341  ;  New  Mexico 
purchased  from,  339-341 ;  admitted,  366 ; 
secedes,  378;  opposed  to  Reconstruction 
Act,  440 ;  again  in  the  Union,  445. 

Thames  River,  battle  of,  235. 

Thayer,  Hon.  Eli,  350  n.  3. 

Third-term  tradition,  296. 

Thirteenth  Amendment,  proposed,  881  ; 
adopted,  429. 

Thomas,  General  George  H.,  campaigns,  388, 
399,  402,  404. 

Thomas,  General  Lorenzo,  431. 

Thompson,  Henry  Adams,  462. 

Thurman,  Allen  G.,  466. 

Ticket  money,  256. 

Ticonderoga,'  89,  90,  128,  139. 

Tilden,  Samuel  ,!.,  447. 

Tippecanoe,  battle  of,  246. 

Toledo,  population  in  1840,  365. 

Tompkins,  Daniel  D.,  259,  277. 

Tonty,  Henri  de,  64,  79. 

Topeka,  351  n.  1. 

Topeka  free-state  constitution,  852. 

Tories,  143  n.  1. 

Townshend  Acts,  117. 


Trade,  in  colonial  times,  101,  102,  103,  115. 
in  original  states,  163,  164,  165;  convention 
at  Annapolis,  165;  regulated  by  Congress, 
168,  169;  with  West  Indies,  207;  regula 
tions  of  English  and  French,  208,  224-229  : 
facilities  for,  279-289. 

Trades  unions,  460. 

Transportation  Bill,  120. 

Travel,  in  1790,  187-191  ;  in  1810,  279-289. 

Treasury  department  established,  198. 

Treasury  notes,  437,  468. 

Treaty,  of  Penn  with  Indians.  56;  of 
Utrecht.  78,  79,  82  ;  of  Ryswick,  78,  82  ;  of 
Aix-la-Chapelle,  81,  82;  of  Paris,  90,  149; 
with  France,  142,  206,  211 ;  Jay's,  209,  210, 
226  ;  with  Spain,  209,  249  ;  of  Ghent,  239  ; 
of  Greenville,  243  ;  of  1818,  261  ;  of  1819, 
261,  262;  Webster-Ashburton,  316,  317; 
with  Mexico,  329,  333,  334 ;  with  Texas, 
320;  of  1846,  326;  with  China,  444;  of 
Washington,  450;  with  Hawaii,  473,  474; 
between  Great  Britain  and  Venezuela,  475. 

Trent,  412. 

Trent,  William,  85. 

Trent  Affair,  412,  413. 

Trenton,  battle  of,  136, 137. 

Tripoli,  war  with,  236. 

Trusts,  see  Corporations. 

Truxton,  Captain  Thomas,  213. 

Tuscarora  Indians,  68,  148  n.  2. 

Twelfth  Amendment,  216.     , 

Tyler,  John,  vice-presidentiar  nominee,  812  ; 
president,  316-326. 


U 

Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  343. 

Underground  Railroad,  352. 

Union  Labor  party,  467. 

Union  Pacific  Railroad,  434,  435. 

United  Colonies  of  New  England,  51,  52, 

United  Labor  party,  467. 

United  States,  236. 

United  States  Bank,  see  National  Bank. 

United  States  bonds,  see  Bonds. 

Usselinx,  William,  38. 

Utah,  Mormons  in,  292,  446;  acquired, 
334  n.  1  ;  slavery  question  in,  340,  341  ;  ad 
mitted,  457  n.  1  ;  silver  interests,  472,  475. 


Vaca,  Cabeza  de,  20. 

Vail,  Alfred,  372. 

Valley  Forge,  139,  141. 

Van  Buren,  Martin,  birth,  294  n.  1  ;  vice- 
presidential  nominee,  306;  president, 
311-316;  presidential  nominee,  885  ;  favors 
10  hours  system,  375. 

Van  Dorn,  General,  391. 

Van  Rensselaer's  expedition,  233. 

Van  Wart,  144  n.l. 

Venezuela  boundary  question,  474,  475. 

Vengeance,  213. 

Vera  Cruz,  battle  of,  32S. 

Vermont  admitted,  228  n.  2.  243 ;  passes 
Personal  Liberty  Law,  843. 


32 


INDEX 


Vespucci,  or  Vespucius,  Amerigo,  14,  16. 

Vevav  settled,  2«7. 

Vice-admiralty  courts.  112,  115,  122. 

Vice  president,  manner  of  electing,  171,  216. 

Vicksburg  captured,  891,  397,  398. 

Vincenncs  settled,  9<>,  l.»l. 

Virginia,  414-418. 

Virginia,  named,  27  ;  settled,  27-33  ;  ci(a.,  w- 

•,  3-J,  83;  a  royal  colony,  34;  defends 
Ohio  valley,  85;  in  colottial  times,  101, 
103-105;  opposes  Stamp  Act,  114;  cedes 
land  to  Congress,  15S,  159  ;  Reserve,  160 : 
plan  of  Co  nstitution,  166,  167 ;  resolutions 
of  1798,  212,  213 ;  resolutions  of  1849,  336; 
Brown's  raid  in,  359 ;  secedes,  386  ;  coast 
blockade,  411;  opposes  reconstruction 
policv,  439,  440 ;  again  in  the  Union,  445. 

Virginia  City,  Mont.,  founded,  436. 

Virginia  City,  Nev.,  founded,  435. 

Virginia  companies.  29,  30. 

Volunteers  during  Civil  War,  386,  387,  422. 


Wabash  River.  Indians  on,  242. 

Wachuselt,  413. 

Wages,  in  1790,  183 ;  in  I860.  375,  876:  in 
1873,  445  ;  in  1880,  460. 

Walla  Walla,  832. 

Wampanoag  Indians,  72. 

War  department,  198. 

Ward,  Ensign,  85,  86. 

Warren,  149. 

Wars,  Indian,  71-73  ;  colonial,  76-87;  French 
and  Indian,  86-91  ;  Revolution,  126-152 ; 
with  France,  213;  with  Tripoli,  236;  war 
for  commercial  independence  (War  of  1812), 
232-239;  Mexican,  326^-328,  333;  Civil,  378- 
418 ;  Spanish,  477,  478. 

Washington,  George,  in  French  and  Indian 
War,  83-89 .4  commander  in  chief,  129 ;  in 
Revolution,  129-150;  president  constitu 
tional  convention,  169;  president,  171,172. 
197-209  ;  social  conditions  at  time  of,  175- 
1%. 

Washington,  national  capital,  201,  214,  215; 
burned,  238,  255;  Confederates  near,  394 
404. 

Washington,  slavery  question  in,  356 ;  a  ter 
ritory,  368  ;  settled,  368 ;  boundary  of,  450  ; 
admitted,  457  n.  1. 
Wa-xp,  236,  237. 

Watauga  Creek  settlements,  191,  192. 

Waterloo  settled,  267. 

Watertown  settled,  47. 

Watlings  Isla"  • 

Watson,  Thomas  E.,  476. 

Wayne,  Anthony,  at  Stony  Point,  142;  in 
Indian  warfare,  242,  243. 

Weaver,  James  B.,  462.  469. 

Webster,  Daniel,  birth,  294  n.  1 ;  opposes 
nullification  doctrine,  305;  secretary  of 
state,  816,  317,  341  ;  speech  on  Compromise 
Bill,  340 ;  death  of,  352,  n.  1. 

Wobster-Ashburton  treatv,  316,  317 

Weitzel,  General,  406 

Wells,  Dr.,  374. 

West  Indies  discovered,  13. 


WPSI  »'     -  id  at 

West         ^lli:i.  adi,  429 

We8t«rn    movement,    244-24B.    _,„    _ 

\Y  intern  Reserve  of  Conne<njcut,  160. 
Western   Union    Telegraph   Company    372, 

460. 

Wethersfield  settlei\,  50. 
Whalley,  Edw.a,  52  n.  2. 
Wheeler,  W     .im  A.,  447. 
Wheelir.^  settled,  193. 
Wh1  f  party,  811,  312,  315,  316,  317,  324,  335, 

846,  862,  868,  355,  363. 
Whisky  Rebellion,  208.  2W. 
White  House  Landing,  battle  of,  393. 
White  Plains,  battle  of,  135. 
White,  John,  28. 
White,  John,  46. 
Whitman,  Marcus,  881. 
Whitney,  Eli,  195,  248. 
Wildcat  state  banks,  808. 
Wilderness  campaign,  404.  405,  406. 
Wilkes,  Captain.  412. 
William,  King,  grants  Massachusetts  char-1 

ter,  53. 

Williams,  144  n.  1. 
Williams,  Roger,  49,  50. 
Williamsburg,    in    colonial    times,   99,   104; 

captured,  893. 

Wilmington,  Del.,  Washington  at,  13S. 
Wilmington,  N.  C..  British  at,  146  ;  captured, 
'  418. 

Wilmot,  David,  32Q. 
Wilmot  Proviso,  329,  836. 
Wilson,  Henry,  '-42,  444. 
Wilson,  William  L    473. 
Wilson  Bill.  473. 


•• 

Wisr-on  state  366> 

Wolfe,  ^ener."1  Jam^  s9   DO. 
Woman  sjiftn    ?,  4.    '  •  17  4715. 
Workingnian,  . 
Wyeth,  Nathaniel  u., 
Wyoming  massacre,  l4o 
Wyoming,  acquired,  334  n.  1  ;    a  territory, 
436;    admitted,  456,  4f    ,-   *"»„.   interests, 


;X,  Y,  Z  mission,"  210. 


Yates,  166  n.  1. 

York,  Canada,  burned,  235 

York,  Me.,  massacre,  77. 

York,  Pa.,  Congress  at,  139. 

York,  Duke  of,  55. 

Yorktown,  surrendered,  146 :  captured, 

Young,  Brigham,  292. 


Zufli  pueblos,  21. 


33 


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